40 Kenyans to get free heart pacemakers

FRIDAY, 06 JANUARY 2012 00:09 BY JOHN MUCHANGI

Kenyans with heart problems will benefit from free pacemakers at the Kenyatta National hospital. The surgeries will continue for the next two weeks with help of doctors from the University of Cologne in Germany, according to Dr Bernard Gitura, a cardiologist at KNH. A pacemaker is a small battery-powered device placed in the chest to help control abnormal heart beats. “This year we are operating on 40 patients who cannot afford the procedure. Most of them are in their 60s and 70s,” said Gitura.

He said although heart block, the condition that causes abnormal heart rhythm, is not common in Kenya, most patients cannot afford treatment. “Out of 100 elderly people above 65 years it could be only six people with the problem,” he said. The small device costs Sh200,000 to Sh300,000 and is mostly imported from Europe.

Private hospitals in Nairobi charge an extra Sh300,000 and Sh500,000 to fit the device. “Here the patients are paying only Sh5,000 and the pacemaker is free,” Gitura said. Patients with heart blocks experience constant fatigue, giddiness and some people occasionally faint. According to the US National Heart Lung and Blood Institute, the heart has its own internal electrical system that controls the rate and rhythm of the heartbeat.

A faulty electrical signaling causes the heart to beat too slowly, too fast or irregularly. This is what the gadget corrects and and the patient resumes normal activities immediately for the next 10 to fifteen years. “Last year at KNH we received about 30 to 40 people with the problem but most of them could not afford the equipment,” he said.

KNH cardiology department said cheap but refurbished pacemakers are available in India but they are not used in Kenya because of legal and ethical reasons. They are normally extracted from patients who die with the gadget, sterilised and then reused. “India does not make the pacemakers yet, so even the refurbished ones are originally from Europe and the US,” he said.

The pacemaker has two parts: the leads and a pulse generator. The pulse generator houses the battery and a tiny computer, and resides just under the skin of the chest. The leads are wires that are threaded through the veins into the heart and implanted into the heart muscle. They send impulses from the pulse generator to the heart muscle, as well as sense the heart's electrical activity.