More than 1000 lives saved in 23 years

National

Operation Open Heart (OOH) has proven to be a success since its inception 23 years ago, says heart specialist Dr Noah Tapaua.
The country’s leading heart specialist told reporters in a media conference that OOH has saved the lives of over 1000 Papua New Guineans who underwent surgeries to correct the defects of their hearts.
“Operation Open Heart took the test of time in Papua New Guinea, politically, economically and financially and we are still going and I must congratulate our sponsors who are really the backbone of this programme,” Dr Tapaua said.
“The nursing strength is almost 30, that number trained is a big step forward.
“So far 1043 Papua New Guineans have gone through and operated on successfully.  We got a very low mortality rate which is less than 2 per cent comparable to any cardiac centre in the world.”
He said this was the result of people working together, in the preparation and screening of heart patients, and strong sponsors.
“Cardiac unit service is a yardstick in any service of a hospital because we need to improve our pathology, into the X-ray. Now we have MRI, CT scan,” Dr Tapaua said.
“It all came out from this programme, a good training for all the nurses, it lift standards for everybody.
Operation Open Heart chairperson Kathy Johnston thanked the sponsors for being supportive every year to make possible the arrangement of visas, accommodation, meals, transport, airfares and security for visiting teams from Australia and Singapore.
These sponsors include Papua New Guinea Immigration Office, Ela Motors, Big Rooster, Boroma Ltd, Curtain Bros Papua New Guinea, Crowne Plaza Hotel, Goodman Fielder International, Hertz car rentals, Institute of Business Studies, Italpresiosi South Pacific, National Gaming Control Board, New Britain Palm Oil, Malaysian Business Association PNG, Mojo Social, Moore Printing, Oil Search, Department of Health, Portofino Distributors, Rapid Response, RH Trading, Sir Brian Bell Foundation, Sir Buri Kidu
Heart Institute, South Pacific Brewery, Stanley Hotel, TNT Air Cargo, TST Group, Waterfront Supermarket-Garamut and WH Industries.