Healthcare must be accessible to everyone. No one should suffer because of not getting precise treatment at the right time. Especially newborn babies and children, who are our future. As a progressive and developing society, it is our fundamental duty to make sure that an accessible healthcare ecosystem is created. However, in India due to multifarious reasons, children from the weaker and underprivileged sections of society never get that much-needed access to healthcare.
This is a major cause of concern. Because there are many diseases including some critical birth defects which prove fatal in the early years of a child’s development. If they are not treated timely and precisely with every possible solution we can offer, then our future generation will be jeopardized or vulnerable to further contingencies. It is high time and need of the hour we must take action.
In this regard, Dr Vikas Kohli, the Founder and Trustee of the Child Heart Foundation (CHF), is on a mission to make people aware of Congenital Heart Diseases (CHD), which is one of the most common birth defects and also provide treatment to the children from the poor section of society.
On a Healthy Mission
According to Dr Kohli’s expert knowledge, one child is born in hundred live births with heart disease. Dr Kohli informs, “In India, every year 170,000 to 200,000 children are born with heart disease, unfortunately, only 16,000 to 20,000 get treated. Rest do not survive or are added to the pool of waitlisted children.” This is indeed heartbreaking.
Dr Kohli further states that the primary challenges with managing CHD cases in India are,
- a lack of paediatric cardiology treatment infrastructure,
- very few number of paediatric cardiologists and paediatric cardiac surgeons, when many more are needed for our population,
- lack of public awareness, and
- very high treatment costs.
Treating the Heart’s Cause
However, Dr Kohli promises to offer solutions for each of these problems. He shares, “All our programs at CHF are designed to meet these challenges and thus provide end-to-end support. We offer free echocardiography screening, and treatment, sponsor live-saving cardiac medicines and train paediatricians and neonatologists in echocardiography.”
CHF is the only organisation offering free foetal echocardiography service to pregnant women for diagnosis of any foetal cardiac abnormality. CHF is one among the very few organisations working with children with heart diseases in India.
Guiding Star of Children’s Hearts
CHF was registered in 2013 as a Trust under the Indian Trust Act 1882 in Delhi. It was founded by Dr Kohli, a leading paediatric cardiologist and six parents who had gone through emotional and financial turmoil with their own children and wanted to help children from underprivileged families who were going through similar conditions.
CHF has all the Government certifications and is registered with BSE Samman, Gold certified by GuideStar India.
Dr Kohli states, “We offer free services in Delhi, Jalandhar (Punjab) and Siliguri (West Bengal). Our organisational mission is that no child should die due to a lack of access to treatment due to the financial constraints of parents.”
The Golden Heart
Furthermore, Fellow American Academy of Paediatrics, Fellow American College of Cardiology, Diplomate American Board of Paediatrics, American Board of Paediatric Cardiology, Dr Vikas Kohli graduated with five gold medals from the University College of Medical Sciences, New Delhi in 1986.
He subsequently finished his Paediatric training from PGIMER (Chandigarh). He completed his Paediatric Residency (USA) at the Montefiore Medical Center, New York and trained in Paediatric Cardiology at the University of Miami. He subsequently practised Paediatric Cardiology in Florida before returning to India.
A Social Reformist’s Dream
He has performed several unique interventional procedures including Flow Restrictor Implantation in Pulmonary Artery for the first time in India; performed a balloon pulmonary valvuloplasty on a 1.7 Kg child; and balloon valvuloplasty on a child less than one day old. He always had this dream of starting free services for children with heart diseases from underprivileged families.
Dr Kohli conveys, “Our patients for both paediatric and foetal screening are referred from all government hospitals in Delhi.
This got fulfilled in 2013 when Child Heart Foundation was founded in Delhi along with six parents whose child was treated by Dr Kohli. His mission is to save each and every child with heart disease.
Dr Kohli adds, “Through various programs, we have screened more than 15,000 children for any cardiac abnormality, got 160 children treated for the diagnosed heart disease, provided foetal echocardiography service to more than 7,000 pregnant women, trained more than 160 paediatricians in echocardiography and are providing free medicines to 22 children with Pulmonary hypertension.”
Social Tech Revolution
Being an experienced leader, Dr Kohli opines how adopting modern digital technologies impacts the social reform sector and how CHF is adapting to the change. He believes that technology has reformed and revolutionized the social sector, this includes access to medical diagnostic tools, organizational management, fundraising and donor engagement.
Dr Kohli says, “We have upgraded to better healthcare diagnostic tools. We are using CRM and cloud-based technology for data management, fundraising and donor engagement.”
CHF Expanding CSR
However, considering the current industry scenario, Fundraising and CSR networking are one of the major challenges faced by CHF and Dr Kohli is overcoming them on a daily basis to drive CHF to the doorstep of every needy child.
That is why Dr Kohli is expanding the CHFs social responsibility drive along with the corporates. He says, “We are trying to involve corporate employees in CSR projects under the employee engagement program.” This involves direct involvement in project implementation processes and fundraising, community awareness programs etc.
An Advice of Compassionate Commitment
Dr Kohli’s advice to budding social entrepreneurs who aspire to venture into the not-for-profit space is straight from the heart. He believes that to survive in the social sector, a person should have commitment, patience and a lot of compassion and empathy. One should be total faith and connect for the cause and self-belief and trust in yourself and the people who are going to be the beneficiaries.
Ensuring the Heartiest and the Healthiest Future
Further envisioning scaling CHFs operations and offerings in 2022 and beyond, Dr Kohli mentions,
- “Children are our future. We want to start a few more OPD centers in Delhi for children from underprivileged families who can’t afford a private consultation and diagnosis. This will be followed by expansion to start an inpatient department and an ICU,
- Replicate our echocardiography training program to other States in India,
- Start free OPD screening and diagnosis centers in two more cities.”
