Over 100 health centres implementing HEARTS initiative

As the highest mortality rate of cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) in the Americas exists in Guyana, the Health Ministry’s Chronic Diseases Unit continues to strengthen its approach towards disease management, with plans to expand its HEARTS initiative to over 30 health centres.
This was disclosed on Friday during the launch of the National Expansion of the HEARTS Initiative for the Management of Cardiovascular Diseases at the Pegasus Hotel, Georgetown.
In 2022, the Chronic Diseases Unit in collaboration with the Pan American Health Organisation/World Health Organisation (PAHO/WHO) launched its first HEARTS technical package to better assist healthcare professionals with the prevention and early detection of CVDs within primary healthcare.

This package included six modules and an implementation guide to effectively support healthcare professionals in the management of risk factors for CVDs and to ensure there is access to standardised, high-quality care to those at risk.
Now, according to the Ministry’s Director of Noncommunicable Diseases, Dr Latchmie Lall, over 100 health centres are implementing this HEARTS initiative, catering to about 36,160 patients.
Plans to expand and facilitate this initiative in 30 more health centres are currently underway.
“We’ve founded new guidelines, we’ve introduced new medications into the system, patients are being switched over to those medications – it’s a gradual step-by-step process that not just the physicians and nurses need to understand, but every level of healthcare worker,” Dr Lall said.
In implementing these HEARTS guidelines, Dr Lall explained that efforts were made to ensure that if a patient moves from one facility to another, their records can be quickly accessed so that their treatment continues at the level required.
She added that for its effectiveness, HEARTS should eventually be adopted by all healthcare facilities in the country, both public and private.
“It’s very important to understand that HEARTS is not just about the Ministry of Health and its primary care facilities. It must be adopted by every [health] facility in the country if we’re looking to have uniform control and really tackle hypertension,” Dr Lall said.

Standardised
Health Minister Dr Frank Anthony echoed a need to standardise the health systems put in place to best assess patients under this programme, and beyond.
“I think this is one of the things that we have to emphasise with all our physicians and the persons who are working to monitor patients. We can’t go off on a tangent, change the medications…this is not efficient,” Dr Anthony said.
“We want to have a continuum of care that allows our primary healthcare to work, to make sure we have the systems in place, to first of all, prevent these things from happening, but if they do happen, that at the primary, secondary and tertiary healthcare levels, we have the requisite systems to take care of people,” Anthony said.
Dr Anthony added that immediate steps to enhance chronic disease management in the country involve examining the existing programmes, noting the gaps and conceptualising how to address those concerns.
“We will ensure great programme coverage in large populations across the country. This is nothing that we can wait for some time and then implement. We have to place a lot of emphasis on how we can establish this as soon as possible,” Dr Anthony said.
“We’re happy that with the collaboration with PAHO/WHO, we would be able to move at a faster pace and get many of these things accomplished,” Anthony said.
PAHO Representative to Guyana, Dr Luis Codina stated that it is important that all aspects of the HEARTS package—standardised treatment, blood pressure measurement, training adaptation and operational care—are supported for the prevention of CVDs, which he noted is of great concern.
“We need to join in discussions to talk about bringing the best quality of health and treatment to enhance healthcare systems,” Dr Codina said.