Doctors rue low awareness about rheumatic diseases

By NT Correspondent

Bengaluru: Indian Rheumatology Association has declared April as Rheumatological Diseases Awareness month. Doctors from the association’s Karnataka chapter on Saturday said that the awareness among people about rheumatological diseases is scanty due to which patients delay medical intervention.

“Rheumatological issues affect about 10-13% of the population and about 3% of patients require attention from specialists. Even specialists can do little if the diagnosis is late,” IRA Karnataka President Dr Chandrashekara S said. He added that it is not just the individual but the entire family that is affected, especially if women suffer from rheumatic disease.

“Rheumatology as a specialization is offered in very few colleges,” IRA Karnataka Patron Dr B.G. Dharmanand said, noting that only about 50 rheumatologists graduate in the country every year. He added that there needs to be at least one rheumatologist per district, while the ideal ratio as per requirement is one per 1.5 lakh population.

The association said that it is conducting free rheumatology consultations at the Sanjay Gandhi Institute of Trauma and Orthopaedics for the benefit of patients, besides raising awareness on social media.

One of the major rheumatic diseases is rheumatoid arthritis (RA), which is an autoimmune disease. The doctors said that although it was incurable about 15 years ago, there has been a lot of advancement and effective treatments have emerged now.

They also pointed out that rheumatic diseases are neither covered under health insurance nor by government healthcare schemes.

Dr Nagaraj S, Secretary of IRA Karnataka said that they had been trying to meet officials and ministers in this regard, but the pandemic had slowed down their efforts.

The city doctors claim that only about 10% of their patients come from Bengaluru,while the rest are from districts. They also said that the association has trained several doctors in rheumatology through fellowships funded by IRA Karnataka.