New diabetic clinic opens at Dr Murthy’s |25 March 2014

Dr Murthy’s Medical & Gastro Clinic situated at Lodge Street has opened a diabetic clinic which will offer a comprehensive diabetic care as this disease is on the increase and becoming a problem in Seychelles.

A specialised diabetologist – Dr Lakshmanan Saravanan – from Chennai, India, was brought in by the clinic for such purpose. He was accompanied by his wife – Dr Mahalakshmi Saravanan – a gynecologist and infertility specialist.

“What I plan is to have a full-fledged diabetic clinic where you have a patient diagnosis, education, counselling, foot monitoring to check up the feet which are normally affected by diabetes. We know that the disease affects from head to toe so we are targeting to test all organs in our body which can be affected by diabetes starting from eyes to the feet.  The clinic will be for the prevention, diagnosis and the treatment of diabetes and related complications,” said Dr Murthy.

He added that there will be a trained nurse at the clinic and visits of diabetologists from abroad who will be coming to the clinic on a regular basis. This is the first time Dr Murthy’s clinic hosts a diabetologist here and he spent three days in the country.  

Dr Murthy also pointed out that many people here in Seychelles have bad wounds which end up with amputation thus losing their leg. He said his clinic aims to prevent that by doing some initial tests by not letting the wound reach the stage of gangrene. The wound has to be treated in advance hence the foot monitoring. The doctor also mentioned getting special slippers and shoes for diabetic patients according to their feet problem.

The specialised diabetologist gave a brief presentation on the disease itself explaining that diabetes is one of the top non-communicable diseases in the world. He said the current incidence of diabetes is 15-20% which means one in every five individuals will have diabetes. During the presentation he educated people on the importance of screening for diabetes.

A public awareness talk on disease was also held at the Seychelles Institute of Teachers Education (ex NIE), Mont Fleuri.