Free Cardiac Camp at 10,000 Feet by Indian Doctors

Volume 3, Jul 2014

Ravi R. Kasliwal MD, DM, Bharat Rawat MD, DM, Gurgaon, India; Kathmandu, Nepal

J Clin Prev Cardiol. 2014;3(3):102-5

Welcome to Tenzing-Hillary Airport. Situated in Lukla, Nepal, this airport is situated at about 10,000 feet above the sea level. The airport is situated in the Himalayas, has a single narrow and short runway, it runs to the edge of the cliff thus rendering it as one of the most dangerous airports to land and take off from. For those of you who are unaware, Lukla is the entrance to the Himalayas. So, although the airport is rendered as one of the most dangerous; it is also one of the busiest airports in Nepal. A large number of helicopters and small aircrafts land here every day bringing mountain climbers who are willing to conquer one of the highest mountains in the world before. Most of them have admitted that the landing on this airport was far more scary than climbing the mountain itself. Once we look at its position and the extreme weather that the airport faces, it seems quite logical what the mountaineers had to say.Even on the best days, when everything is favorable, the airport is only operational for a few hours before it gives in to fog or strong winds. But that is least of the worries since a mere mistake of 1 to 2 meters will crash the plane during landing either resulting in hitting the mountain or over running the runway. Taking off is quite stressful too, failure to reach the required speed will result in crashing of the plane into the abyss down below. As it can be seen, it isn’t a walk in the park. The airport was carved out of the mountain and the genius behind this was Sir Edmund Hillary. This happened back in 1965, twelve years after he had conquered Mount Everest. Nowadays, thanks to this airport, one can arrive here from Khatmandu in a matter of hours compared to the previous journey of six days.However, planes that land over here are the small ones only. The track is 65 feet wide and is only capable of taking care of aircrafts such as Twin Otter or Dronier. The runway also qualifies for one the steepest runways with a gradient of 12%. Pilots usually land uphill to let gravity help in stopping the plane. Keeping in view all the above, it is not surprising to know that this airport had its fair share of accidents although they are much less than what you’d expect. Hats off to the Nepalese pilots who make 1-2 flights there everyday!

Another description of lukla airport

If you can stand to keep your eyes open, the view out the airplane window during landing at Lukla Airport will stay with you forever.

At first, a white haze of cloud cover will obscure the surrounding mountains. Then, as the plane descends, a tiny gray strip at an elevation of 9,100 feet will appear in the distance, almost camouflaged by surrounding greenery. This 65 by 1,500-foot patch of asphalt is the runway. At its southern end is a 2,000-foot drop into a valley. At its northern end, a stone wall and a hairpin turn.

If all goes well, you'll hit the tarmac with little more than a few bumps and lurches. That odd sensation of traveling uphill is not an illusion: the runway has a gradient of 12 percent—meaning when a plane takes off, it plunges downhill toward a 2,000-foot abyss.

Accidents are common—between October 2008 and October 2013, four small Lukla-bound aircraft crashed, killing 33 people. The airport does close in fierce winds and poor visibility, but weather in the mountains changes so rapidly that a flight may already be airborne when conditions become dangerous.

The Cardiac Camp

The long awaited dream mission of ours finally came true when we set towards Lukla. This is a milestone for us all since this is the first ever free Cardiac camp at such an altitude in Nepal by the Indian cardiac doctors led by Dr R R Kasliwal. A team of ten doctors and paramedics reached Lukla on 16th April morning and went to the Lukla Pasang Lhamu Nicole Nikke Hospital for the free cardiac camp for two days.

The pre-arrangement was made nicely. The necessary arrangements were made by a team that went a week prior to the Lukla Township where they met the Police, Army and other district officials including Airline offices and informed all possible people in that locality about the free medical camp which was organized by Norvic in the coming week. The local people were very excited hearing this.

The zeal and enthusiasm of the people living in an altitude of 2840 meters and that population of around 2000 people of that locality were really charged and were on their tip toes to respond to our free cardiac camp which is one of the rarest event of the country where such camp is being held for the first time in Nepal in such a high summit!!!

The free camp started on 16th April morning when the Norvic Team reached Lukla at around 7:00 am. After the group of Indian Doctors led by Dr. Kasliwal had breakfast in the hotel, the troop proceeded to the Lukla Hospital which is an uphill terrain and all of us climbed the hill and reached the destination at around 15 minutes.

On arrival at the hospital, the management team of the hospital gave a traditional and warm welcome by offering mala and khada to our respected visiting doctors and the team.

Immediately our team started their duty of examining the patients who had walked from a long distance for many hours. Patients were from all age group from five years to ninety two years.

All together there were around 150 patients. ECG, Echo, Blood tests and X- rays were provided for free. All medications were distributed for free.

Next day also we started at 9:00am and saw about 170 patients of various heart disease and few non cardiac patients as well. After lunch, Dr Bharat Rawat conducted a class for local staff and explained about the treatment of various heart problems. This lecture was for about one and a half hour. He also taught the local doctors and nurses about use of cardiac defibrillator and using their Ultrasound machine for doing Echocardiography.

During the free medical camp period, one five year old child came to the camp with a broken elbow due to fall injury same day. We got him airlifted to our Norvic Hospital Kathmandu for free surgical treatment, Dr. Praveen Nepal the senior orthopedic surgeon (trained in AIIMS, Delhi) operated the child and his elbow has been corrected and a poor boy from a remote place in Nepal has got a new life!!

For our mission of this noble deed of free medical camp in Lukla, the local community and the Lukla Hospital staff and management team were very grateful and thankful and they have said that they will never forget the noble deed, which Indian team of Doctors Under the leadership of Dr Kasliwal has done, and also thanked Dr. Bharat Rawat

Also please note that another memorable incident took place on last day of the camp when the Superintendant of Lukla Hospital suddenly felt angina and got his heart examined with Dr. Kasliwal and Bharat Rawat.

He was then airlifted to Norvic hospital and three critical blockages were found and were treated successfully by Dr. Rawat and his team with three stents.