The pendulum has swung in the country with respect to tackling non communicable diseases. This is evident from the key initiatives under the new National Health Policy 2017, which lays a lot of emphasis on screening and prevention of these diseases. With changing lifestyle and demographics, it is clear that India would have to change the way it tackles healthcare in the future.

With this in mind, Landmark Group, hosted a state level workshop to facilitate learning and collaborative action in an effort towards improving response to non-communicable diseases (NCDs), such as cancer, diabetes, stress, hypertension and anemia. The workshop was a joint initiative between landmark Group (Lifestyle & Max), National Health Mission (NHM), Govt. of Karnataka and Karnataka Health Promotion Trust (KHPT). Dr. Shalini Rajneesh, Principal Secretary, Department of Health and Family Welfare, Government of Karnataka inaugurated the workshop. Dr Rathan Kelkar, Mission Director, National Health Mission was the Chief Guest on the occassion.

The workshop was inaugurated with a welcome address by Mr. Venkatramana B, Group President-HR, Landmark Group, who welcomed the guests and spoke about Landmark Group’s social initiatives which focused on Non Communicable Diseases. The inaugural address was given by Dr Shalini Rajneesh, followed by the keynote address by Dr Denis Xavier who is the Vice-Dean of St. John’s Medical College, Bangalore.

The sessions commenced with the introduction of the panel by Dr. Ravikumar, Regional Director, Government of India. The workshop was led by community healthcare professionals such as Dr Anitha, Deputy Director State NCD Cell Government of Karnataka, Mr Prem Anand from Apollo Health Services, Ms Chandana Kiran & Mr Nakul Goswami of Intellecap,; Dr Balu PS, JJM Medical College, Dr Muralikrishna, Medical Officer, Department of AYUSH, GoK, Prof. K Ganapathy, President, Apollo Telemedicine Networking Foundation and Dr Reynold Washington, KHPT.

The focus of the workshop was on the efforts and actions towards prevention, management of non-communicable diseases; which require collaborative action. The dialogue continued with insightful discussions led by the panel members- who spoke about the national and state level initiatives and public private partnerships towards prevention & managing NCDs. The sessions came to an end with concluding remarks from the panelists on the learnings, challenges, innovations, successes and way-forward for improving response to non-communicable diseases.

Mr. Venkatramana B, Group President-HR, Landmark Group said “As a socially responsible organization, we have taken the responsibility to advocate and ensure that people with NCDs manage their health with adequate knowledge and access to medical assistance. We are grateful to all the panelists and attendees who joined us today to extend their support in the fight against NCDs”.