New Delhi: There's good news for people suffering from heart ailments. The Implantable Cardioverter Defibrillator (ICD) ? a gadget that's closer to the heart than any other machine has ever been ? has been introduced in India.
On display at an exhibition at the 15th Asian Pacific Congress of Cardiology in Mumbai, the ICD can monitor the heart's rhythm continuously and deliver multiple internal shocks when they find a life threatening rhythm disturbance, to bring heartbeats back to normal.
Medical Director, B M Birla Heart Research Centre, Kolkata, Dr. Anil Mishra, says, "50 per cent of all cardiac deaths are sudden in nature and are caused due to rapid, life threatening rhythm disturbances of the heart. The ICDs seek to prevent and cure these disturbances."
Developed by Medtronic, there are two types of ICDs. The simple version besides reducing symptoms of heart failure and increasing life span, responds to rhythm disturbances.
The Combo Device on the other hand has six programs, doubles up as a pacemaker and can also store ECGs.
Dr Mishra says, "The Combo Device also has a built-in alarm that detects heart failure and sounds well in advance, giving time for a patient to go and see a doctor."
The simple version costs anything between Rs 3.5 to 7.5 lakhs while the Combo device, with the built in alarm system and the pacemaker, is priced between Rs 7 and 8 lakhs but Dr Mishra says that buying an ICD works out to be less expensive than drug treatment spanning a number of years.
However, this technology is far from new. Medtronic says that the simple ICD was introduced in India in 1995 and the upgraded Combo version in 2002.
According to Marketing Manager, Medtronic India, Rajesh Radhakrishnan, "Over 80 per cent of the doctors were not aware of this technology."
Radhakrishnan says that Medtronic is trying to develop the ICD further so that it can administer drugs in the future as well as monitor a patient's vital signs.
They also want to improve it in such a way that it can be upgraded from the outside, without having to remove it from within the body, upgrading it and then placing it back in.
Medtronic is also developing new MicroTech capacitors - ICD batteries - that are thin, space efficient and contoured, so that the ICD can be made smaller while still delivering powerful therapy to the patient.
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