Aorta of Truth

New Delhi’s swank Escorts Heart Institute and Research Centre (EHIRC) is a pilgrimage of sorts for cardiac patients. Evidence of this lies in the fact that to meet the hospital’s founder, executive director and surgeon-in-chief Naresh Trehan, one has to walk a corridor or so in bare feet or in rubber sandals. It’s one hospital rule that knows no VIPs. Everyone has to surrender his or her footwear to enter Trehan’s dust- and germ-controlled consultation room.

Escorts, as EHIRC is invariably referred to, is pretty much going according to Trehan’s dream plan that began in the late ’70s when he was practicing in New York. A lot of Indians started coming to him for heart surgery because there was no such facility in India. That’s when he decided to pack his bags and head home. "I wanted to effect change and not merely start a private practice," he says. Fourteen years later, the 300-bed hospital, run by the tractors-and-motorcycle major, has a reputation that is hard to beat. Last year, Escorts performed 4,000 surgeries, a world record. "We have been able to assemble teams and cardiac care systems that are the finest in the world," says Trehan, who performs about 14 to 18 operations daily.

If Escorts’ founding principles were to help provide world-class heart care, its milling wards and outpatient clinics point to a grim truth: a heart disease epidemic. "The incidence of coronary artery disease is 2.4 to 3 times more in India than in western countries," says cardiologist Dr Samir Srivastava. He claims doctors at Escorts have been able to bring down mortality rates from 20 per cent to 5 simply by checking critical heart damage during what is called the ‘golden hour’, the one hour following a heart attack.

Facilities abound. Two heart command centres provide intensive care for patients. The hospital also has air ambulances, an Airtel mobile phone emergency service (797), trans-telephonic ECG monitors for stay-at-home patients needing constant monitoring, a single-arm robot surgeon called Aesop and a popular executive diagnostic programme for early detection among high-risk people. A normal up-to-nine-days-stay open-heart surgery package costs Rs 1.80 lakh, while an emergency one is Rs 10,000 dearer. An up-to-week-long-stay closed-heart surgery package sets you back by Rs 95,000. There are also free heart camps for those who can’t afford the prices. You could say that five-star Escorts is a rich man’s heart clinic but that isn’t really the heart of the matter. It is really about sheer quality and the amazing clinical experience of the doctors here.