Heart patients at Cape Town's Tygerberg Hospital will benefit from a multimillion-rand investment by private-and public-sector partners in equipping and setting up a new cardiology facility.
Medical technology company Medtronic is the principal partner in the venture, which enables Tygerberg's division of cardiology to offer advanced treatments to more patients, more cheaply and often without admitting them to the wards. This will include radial angiography, which involves using a dye to find blocked arteries.
Doctors access the radial blood vessel in the arm instead of puncturing large blood vessels in the groin area. A stent - a mesh tube through which blood can flow - is then placed in the blocked artery.
The new service is expected to alleviate delays in scheduling angiography procedures, for which there is great demand.
Dr Hellmuth Weich said the facility is the only one of its kind in Africa that allows patients to be admitted, undergo angiography and be discharged on the same day. "It is safer ... it is also cheaper, mainly because of the reduction of hospital stay from more than one day to same-day discharge," said Weich, a cardiologist at the hospital.
"We have an avalanche of coronary disease in South Africa."
The World Health Organisation said cardiovascular disease accounts for more than 17million deaths a year.
Professor Anton Doubell, head of cardiology at Tygerberg Hospital, said that every year more than 50000 patients required advanced cardiac care. The new facility will allow for a considerable increase in the number of poor patients receiving treatment.
Stakeholders in the venture include Tygerberg Hospital and Stellenbosch University. At the forefront of the new service is the non-profit organisation Sunheart, which was started by five cardiologists at the hospital.
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