Impact Of School Health Program –A Retrospective Analysis of Pediatric Echo’s Done in A Tertiary Set-Up

Abstract

This study was conducted to find out the efficacy of the school health program in picking up heart diseases and hence providing benefit to the patients. The patients were screened on the basis of degree of murmur and any abnormal ECG and X-ray findings and then subjected to echocardiography. Total no of patients screened were 18721 of which 100 were detected to have heart murmur. The incidence of heart disease found in our setup is 0.42% over six month’s duration. 57.5% of patients were <5 yrs followed by 38.7% in 5-15 yrs age group. VSD (22.86%), ASD (21.4%) were the most commonly diagnosed acyanotic congenital heart diseases and TOF (5.7%) was the commonest cyanotic CHD. Pericardial Effusion (60%) was the commonest acquired heart disease.23.75% of these were referred to higher centre for further management and 37% of patients with a school health card have availed these facilities for free. 62.6% patients from the community were referred through school health for heart disease.