NAIROBI, Kenya, Oct 29 – Campaigners seeking to create awareness on stroke and heart diseases have called for joint efforts to address existing gaps hampering equitable access to care for people living with stroke and other cardiovascular diseases (CVDs).
The call was made by Kenya Cardiac Society (KCS), World Heart Federation and AstraZeneca’s Healthy Heart Africa (HHA) initiative during an event on Saturday to commemorate World Stoke Day also attended by officials from the Ministry of Health.
Speaking during the roundtable event, stakeholders from patient-led organizations, public and private sectors and healthcare professionals pointed out that there are still gaps that need multi-stakeholder engagements and a call for action to be addressed.
This is despite the strides made in bridging health system gaps in cardiovascular diseases detection, management and control through various health system strengthening initiatives.
KCS President Dr. Bernard Samia noted that the society has made great strides in creating awareness of cardiovascular health and encouraging heart-healthy living in collaboration with the Ministry of Health, the academia, NGOs and health providers.
“Marking global days such as World Stroke Day is one of the avenues we leverage to let people know about the dangers of cardiovascular diseases and how to prevent and manage them,” Samia said.
“Forums such as today’s also go a long way in identifying collaborative solutions that will further steer us towards Universal Health Coverage (UHC),” he added.
A stroke occurs when the blood supply to a part of the brain is interrupted either by a clot or by a bleed (hemorrhage) which causes the surrounding brain tissues to die.
This leaves stroke survivors with disabilities and impairments that affect how they move, speak, think and feel.
High blood pressure, obesity, sedentary lifestyle, diabetes, heart and blood vessel diseases, smoking, excessive alcohol use, age and sex are some of the risk factors of stroke listed by the National Heart, Blood and Lung Institute.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), around 15 million people globally suffer from stroke annually with an estimated 5.8 million succumbing to it.
Whereas the burden of stroke is reducing in developed countries, two-thirds of the deaths occurred in low-income and middle-income countries.
A report by World Heart Federation (2019) attributed more than one million deaths in Sub-Saharan Africa to cardiovascular diseases, accounting for 5.4 per cent of all global CVD-related fatalities and 13 per cent of all deaths in Africa.
Vice president, Global Sustainability and Access to Healthcare at AstraZeneca Ashling Mulvaney noted that strategic partnerships will play a significant role in achieving sustainable solutions to increase the resilience of local health systems as far as cardiovascular diseases are concerned.
“Our partnerships with public and private healthcare facilities are helping to integrate blood pressure screening and hypertension management into routine care,” she said.
Mulvaney added: “In Kenya, the programme has so far conducted over 17.4 million blood pressure screenings, identified over 3.3 million elevated blood pressure readings with over 806,000 of these being confirmed diagnoses for hypertension.”
