Ujjal Biswas (name changed on request) was suffering from shortness of breath for the past year, along with a feeling of lethargy and other discomforts. The 60-year old was suffering from congestive cardiac failure. Further examination revealed that he was suffering from de-synchronisation of heart muscles.

The de-synchronisation of muscles reduces the heart’s pumping capacity. As a result, only one to one-and-a-half litres of blood is pumped into the body, instead of six. This leads to heart failure.

Implanting a Cardiac Resynchronisation Therapy (CRT) can save the patient’s life, as in the case of Biswas. The functioning of the CRT is similar to a pacemaker. It sends electrodes into the heart through wires and synchronises the muscle function, which improves the patient’s condition.

The usual causes of de-synchronisation of heart muscles are previous heart attacks, uncontrolled blood pressure, certain congenital diseases and in tropical countries, some kinds of infections affecting the heart muscles.

According to cardiologists, more than four lakh patients in India, a bulk of them from Calcutta, require this therapy. But it fails to help patients in 30 per cent cases. The failure rate of this therapy is only five per cent in the western countries, he said.

“Ways are being found to ensure that 100 per cent of these patients benefit from this therapy,” said Bernhard Kupper, a cardiologist from Germany. Kupper is part of the three-member team of cardiologists from Germany that is in the city now.

The team will meet doctors at BM Birla Heart Research Centre and Rabindranath Tagore International Institute of Cardiac Sciences to discuss improved CRT devices and how they can be used more effectively.

“CRT is less complicated and requires shorter hospitalisation,” said Anil Mishra, an interventional cardiologist at BM Birla Heart Research Centre. A patient can return home in two days and return to normal life in a week.