Young mother gets free life-saving heart surgery

By Olivia Miwil - October 20, 2018 @ 4:39pm

Cardiothoracic surgeon Dr Abu Bakar Mamat (right) said Arrty Yantuni’s heart could have stopped if it was left untreated. NSTP/ Khairull Azry Bidin.

KOTA KINABALU: A young mother who underwent free heart surgery at a private hospital, here, is grateful for a new lease on life and being able to take better care of her child.

Arrty Yantuni, 21, from Kota Belud said she had been sick and felt tired easily for almost a year after she delivered her baby last year.

“It is a great relief that I am finally cured and able to live a normal life,” she said, breaking into tears at a sharing session of Gleneagles Kota Kinabalu Hospital’s Life Renewed programme.

Cardiothoracic surgeon Dr Abu Bakar Mamat said Arrty’s heart could have stopped if it was left untreated.

“Her condition is known as cardiomegaly. It was caused by infection. Water was building up around the organ,” he said.

“Within a short period after she was referred here, we managed to do a checkup, definitive diagnosis and treatment for her. She is now fully recovered.”

Arrty is one of four underprivileged patients in Sabah whose lives have been turned around after receiving free medical treatment under the hospital’s corporate giving programme.

The others are 3-year-old Noah Nicholas Lester who was diagnosed with Hirschsprungs’s disease, Turnina Tubasa, 59, with an 8cm tumour in left brain and Nurul Aini Mohd Safie, 18, with chronic rheumatic heart disease.

The hospital’s chief executive officer Noel Cheah said during the past three years about RM500,000 was allocated under the Life Renewed fund for 22 patients in Sabah.

“The criteria for eligible beneficiaries include they have to be Malaysians, come from household with incomes below RM5,000 and have seen and referred by our consultants,” he said.

Parkway Pantai launched the programme in 2012 for patients in Malaysia and Singapore. The programme has enabled more than 1,300 underprivileged patients to gain access to the group’s network of healthcare professionals and medical facilities.

This year, Parkway Pantai has injected fresh funding of RM6 million for the programme.