Collaboration among South Asian nations emphasised to improve

With South Asian nations facing common maternal health care issues, medical experts from India today set the road map for stakeholders of the health care sector of Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Maldives to tackle them by drawing their experiences and learning from India.
The road map was laid out at the Asia Pacific Congress on Diabetes, Hypertension & Metabolic Syndrome in Pregnancy (2016) at Colombo in Sri Lanka, organised by the South Asia Initiative for Diabetes in Pregnancy (SAIDIP) and the DIP Asia-Pacific Symposium (DIPAP) on "Diabetes, Hypertension, Metabolic Syndrome and Pregnancy".
Leading the Indian contingent, Dr Hema Divakar, Co-Chair of FIGO (International Federation of Gynaecology and Obstetrics) HIP Working Group and Past President of FOGSI (The Federation of Obstetric and Gynaecological Societies of India),noted that South Asia and Africa account for about 70 per cent of the deliveries worldwide annually.

"So it becomes imperative for us to collaborate and evolve solutions based on local problems instead of looking elsewhere for guidance," said Divakar, who was SAIDIP Conference President,according to a press release issued here.
She cited instances where the medical fraternity in India evolved solutions for problems locally.
"We brought into practise a Primary Prevention Model,that is, address the root cause of all these problems and tackle them at the elementary level through innovations," she said, adding, it involved capacity building of the medical and paramedical staff to tackle these issues.

Among South Asian countries, India leads the way forward for establishing guidelines for management of Diabetes in pregnancy and capacity building for all health care providers with a novel and innovative skills training module, she said stressing the need for other countries to take a similar approach.

With over 30 million deliveries per year in India, "we have roughly five million pregnancies with raised blood sugars.It is a challenge to the health system to manage these, not only in pregnancy - but also for years beyond pregnancy, in order to prevent Type 2 adult diabetes," Divakar added.
"India and Bangladesh are no exception. The prevalence of Gestational Diabetes has steadily increased from 2 per cent in 1982 to 16.55 per cent in 2002 in India. We were quick to understand the magnitude of the problem and evolved guidelines for the medical fraternity to address Gestational Diabetes at every level. We recommend other countries facing this issue to follow our model," she said.

More than 350 delegates from the South Asian and Asia Pacific Region and other countries around the world are participating in the three-day conference from September 8.