Dr Devi Prasad Shetty (born 8 May 1953) is an Indian cardiac surgeon and the founder and chairman of Narayana Health, a chain of hospitals based in Bengaluru. By applying the methods of mass production to heart surgery he brought its price down to a fraction of what it costs elsewhere, and he designed one of the world’s cheapest health insurance schemes for farmers. He has been called the Henry Ford of heart surgery.
Quick Facts
| Full name | Devi Prasad Shetty |
| Born | 8 May 1953, Kinnigoli, Dakshina Kannada district, Karnataka |
| Age | 73 |
| Education | Kasturba Medical College, Mangalore (MBBS, MS); training in cardiac surgery at Guy’s Hospital, London |
| Occupation | Cardiac surgeon, entrepreneur |
| Known for | Founder of Narayana Health; low-cost cardiac surgery; Yeshasvini health insurance |
| Awards | Padma Shri (2004), Padma Bhushan (2012) |
| Spouse | Shakuntala Shetty |
| Children | 4 |
Early Life
He was born at Kinnigoli, a village near Mangalore, the eighth of nine children. He decided to become a heart surgeon while at school, on hearing that a surgeon in South Africa, Christiaan Barnard, had transplanted a human heart.
Education
He took his medical degree and a master’s degree in surgery at Kasturba Medical College in Mangalore. He then trained in cardiac surgery in England, at Guy’s Hospital in London and other centres, for about six years.
Career
Calcutta
He returned to India in 1989 to work at the B. M. Birla Heart Research Centre in Calcutta. In 1992 he operated successfully on a nine-day-old baby, the first heart operation on a newborn in the country.
In Calcutta he became the heart surgeon of Mother Teresa after she suffered a heart attack. He has often said that she changed his view of what a doctor is for.
Bangalore
He moved to Bangalore in 1997 to start the Manipal Heart Foundation. In 2001, with money from his father-in-law’s construction business, he opened Narayana Hrudayalaya on the southern edge of the city.
The model
His hospital did very large numbers of operations, more than thirty heart operations a day at its main centre, far more than leading hospitals in the West.
- Surgeons who do the same procedure many times become quicker and better at it.
- Expensive machines are used through the day and not for a few hours.
- Supplies are bought in bulk, and some items, such as surgical gowns, are made locally.
- Patients who can pay full price subsidise those who cannot.
The cost of a heart bypass was brought down to about a hundred thousand rupees or less, with results comparable to those of well-known American hospitals. The group, now called Narayana Health, runs hospitals in many Indian cities and one in the Cayman Islands, opened in 2014 to treat patients from the Americas. It was listed on the stock exchanges in January 2016.
Yeshasvini
In 2003, with the Karnataka government and the state’s farmers’ cooperatives, he launched Yeshasvini, a micro-insurance scheme. For a premium that began at five rupees a month, members were covered for hundreds of kinds of operation. Millions of farmers joined, and it became a model for later public insurance schemes.
Telemedicine
With the Indian Space Research Organisation he set up telemedicine links by satellite, so that heart specialists in Bangalore could advise on patients in remote district hospitals.
Public Roles
He has advised the central and Karnataka governments on medical education and health policy, argues for training far more doctors and nurses, and chaired the Karnataka committee that prepared for a third wave of Covid-19.
Honours
- Padma Shri (2004) and Padma Bhushan (2012)
- The Economist’s innovation award for business process (2011)
- Karnataka Ratna
Personal Life
He and his wife, Shakuntala, have four children; two of his sons work in the hospital group. He still operates and sees patients, and practises yoga. He has said that a solution that is not affordable is not a solution.
Featured image: Devi Shetty at the Financial Times Boldness in Business Awards, March 2013. Photo by the Financial Times, licensed under CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
