Eminent paediatrician and neonatologist at KEM Hospital, Pune, Dr Sudha Chaudhuri was conferred with the prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award at the 41st Annual Convention of the National Neonatology Forum recently organised in Kolkata.
NNF National Neonatology Forum is the apex body of neonatologists and related professionals and is actively involved in advocacy, policy making, research and improving the quality of neonatal health care practices.
Speaking with The Indian Express, Dr Chaudhuri said low birth weight babies need a close follow up, especially in smaller cities, where there are not adequate facilities.
Dr Chaudhari is a Consultant at the Department of Paediatrics and Terre Des Hommes (TDH) Rehabilitation and Morris Child Development Centre at King Edward Memorial Hospital, Pune for almost five decades. Her persistent efforts on working to better the outcome of high-risk infants gave birth to ICMR-funded “Pune Low Birth weight Study-Birth to 22 years”.
It was sometime in 1981 that they had started a 24-bed neonatal unit — then the largest in Pune. “Two years prior to that we had started the TDH and the aim was to provide all facilities under one roof for a special child. The effort was such that we started saving low birth weight babies and then followed it up with the follow up study. This was the longest follow up study in the country,” Dr Chaudhuri recalled.
She combined her research, clinical skills and compassion to help babies who were falling off the development ladder by rehabilitating them at the KEM Hospital. This monumental work which followed a cohort of low birth weight infants from birth till 22 years of age provided for the first time the outcome till adulthood of these high risk babies, in low resource settings, according to experts at the National Neonatology Forum. The annual meeting was held in December last year and the lifetime achievement award was given by Suvir Anandji Maharaj. Dr Siddarth Ramji, President, NNF-2022, and others were also present on the occasion.
Dr Madhur Rao, Senior Deputy Medical Administrator, said Dr Chaudhuri has been a part of newborn care at KEM Hospital right from the beginning and has played a pivotal role in transforming it into a state of art NICU. Her work in neonatology started at a time when survival of low birth weight newborns was a challenge, resources were few and technology had not evolved the way it has today. “She has not only trodden the path of treatment and research but also trained many young neonatologists, paediatricians and psychologists who will help the next generation of professionals and in turn better the outcomes,” he said.
