A total of 4984 patients suffering from rheumatic heart disease (RHD) were recorded as of July this year.
Ministry of Health and Medical Services national RHD coordinator Verenaisi Werekoro highlighted this during the Fiji Oral Health Association annual conference in Nadi last week.
Ms Werekoro said there had also been an increase in pregnant mothers and young adults diagnosed with RHD.
“Our target group is school-aged children from five to 15 years,” she said.
“Rheumatic heart disease is like a complication of acute rheumatic fever.
“Most of the time, I’m picking up cases when its already at the diagnosis stage of RHD.”
She said it was important to understand the signs of acute traumatic fever.
“So, we are able to pick them up early before they progress to serious stages of RHD.
“For our cases in the different divisions, we have a total of 845 in the Northern Division, 1160 in the Western Division, and Central Division seems to be the hot spot with 2979.
“We also understand there has been an increase in outreach screenings whereby we are able to detect more cases.
“And as of July this year, our total RHD cases is 4984 and every day we get new cases from the different sub-divisions and divisions.”
RHD is caused by damage to the heart valves following one or more episodes of acute rheumatic fever (ARF).
