Vice-President launches India Valve Registry to improve heart valve care
Vice-President C. P. Radhakrishnan launched the “India Valve Registry” on Saturday (September 4, 2026) at India Valves 2026, a three-day national conference on valvular and structural heart disease being held in the city. The registry is a clinician-led, multicentre, patient-level and longitudinal research platform designed to study valve disease and valve interventions.
Speaking on the occasion, Mr. Radhakrishnan highlighted advances in cardiovascular medicine that have given hope to millions. He noted that valvular and structural heart diseases pose a growing challenge, but modern treatment has transformed the way these conditions are managed. He stressed that while global evidence is important, India must generate evidence from its own patients and its own clinical experience. He cited the Indian Council of Medical Research’s findings on the high burden of non-communicable diseases and said the registry would help identify challenges and gaps, learn from experiences and improve patient care.
Health Minister K. G. Arunraj said Tamil Nadu had joined the initiative as a stakeholder. He referred to the Chief Minister’s Comprehensive Health Insurance Scheme (CMCHIS), under which the government provides cashless treatment to about 1.48 crore families at more than 2,000 empanelled hospitals. He said the Chief Minister has announced in the Legislative Assembly that the annual coverage per family will be raised from ₹5 lakh to ₹25 lakh, a five-fold increase. This, he said, would put advanced cardiac procedures within the reach of the poorest household.
Mr. Arunraj also described the Tamil Nadu STEMI programme, which links 18 government medical college hub hospitals with cath labs to 188 peripheral hospitals. Patients with heart attacks in remote areas receive guideline-directed reperfusion free of cost. He said this hub-and-spoke model has been cited internationally as a template for heart attack care in developing regions. The network is now being expanded with 10 additional hub hospitals, he added.
The Health Minister shared data from CMCHIS on valve care over the last 20 months. A total of 2,590 patients received heart valve replacement surgery — mechanical or bioprosthetic — at 110 empanelled government and private hospitals. That means an average of about four valves were replaced every day. The government spent over ₹34 crore on these procedures. The youngest patient was four years old and the oldest was 83. Women made up 53% of the patients. Nearly four out of five bioprosthetic valves implanted were manufactured in India.
At the same time, Mr. Arunraj acknowledged persistent health challenges. “Nearly half of these case sheets still carry the diagnosis of rheumatic heart disease and one in four of these patients was below 40 years of age,” he said. He said the State government would support the registry in three ways: encouraging all empanelled hospitals that perform valve interventions to register their cases, using evidence from the registry to refine treatment packages and empanelment standards, and improving follow-up care.
G. Sengottuvelu, Course Director and interventional cardiologist at Apollo Hospitals, explained the scope of the registry. It is a dedicated patient-level database covering valve diseases and interventions, capturing details such as clinical profile, severity of disease, imaging and anatomical findings, treatment and procedure planning, devices and techniques used, immediate results and complications, discharge outcomes, rehospitalisation, functional recovery and survival during follow-up.
The conference serves as a platform for clinicians and researchers to discuss the latest developments in valvular heart disease treatment.
