Ahalia Hospital: Comfort zone for heart patients

The Department of Cardiac Sciences at Ahalia Hospital has consultant and specialist cardiologists that provide clinical consultations, diagnostic services like ECG, echocardiography, treadmill, holter, ambulatory blood pressure monitoring, coronary angiography and therapeutic services like coronary and peripheral angioplasties. The department has a well-equipped cardiac catheterisation laboratory with round-the-clock services catering to heart attacks. The cardiologists also speak Arabic, English, Hindi, Urdu, Bengali, Malayalam and Marathi so that patients can feel comfortable.
 
Full-fledged services
The cardiology departments at Ahalia Hospital in Musaffah and Hamdan Street are manned by six doctors that provide round-the-clock services. Besides various facets of cardiac services, the department also caters to balloon mitral valvotomies, device closures of atrial septal defects and patent ductus arteriosus, alongside round-the-clock cardiac emergency services with primary angioplasty service.

The cardiac surgical and thoracic surgical services are provided by an excellent team led by Dr Santhosh Nalliyath, Consultant Cardiac Surgeon. To date, the team has completed 500 cardiac surgeries successfully since its inception in 2014. There is also a well-equipped intensive care unit for post-procedure care.
 
Campaigns to promote heart health
Ahalia Hospital offers heath check-up packages that run throughout the year. This year, it is focused on Coronary CT calcium scoring for the needy, as part of month-long celebrations centred on World Heart Day. Apart from this, the department organises regular radio talks, heart health talks and webinars for the population at large. Ahalia Cardiac Club, a monthly forum, is conducted for general public discuss various options to maintain good health of heart.

Raising health defences
The hospital ensures that all visitors and patients are screened at entry for temperature, Covid exposure and symptoms. All patients that are admitted for elective or emergency procedures have to undergo a mandatory Covid RT-PCR test, while visitors are not allowed inside intensive care units without Covid negative reports.

In addition to that, heart patients are advised to avoid discontinuing any medicines without the advice of the cardiologist. They should eat healthy, exercise regularly, and comply with the precautionary measures for Covid prevention like social distancing, compulsory mask wearing and hand hygiene. They should also report Covid-like symptoms as early as possible and consult their physician.

Looking ahead
Ahalia Hospital has grown tremendously in the last decade and now offers a full-fledged cardiac service including cardiac catheterisation, which completed 20,000 angiograms successfully since 2006), cardiac and thoracic surgery services; pacemaker implantations; and percutaneous device closures, alongside emergency STEMI (heart attack) services. In the future, it aims to provide cardiac electrophysiology and paediatric cardiology services.

Advice for residents
Residents in the UAE tend to neglect physical activity, healthy eating habits, as well as weight and regular health check-ups. Smoking is also quite prevalent. Routine check-ups should start by 40 years in general and 35 years of age, especially if other factors like smoking or positive family history for coronary artery disease is present.