Dr. Devi Prasad Shetty
M.S., FRCS (London)
Member, Board of Governors, Medical Council of India
Dr. Devi Prasad Shetty, Chairman of Narayana Hrudayalaya Group, is an Indian born doctor and cardiac surgeon. He began his career as a cardiac surgeon at the National Health Services, working at the Guys Hospital in London, United Kingdom. He was associated with them till he moved to India in 1989. He is the founder of the Narayana Hrudayalaya Group which includes the Rabindranath Tagore International Institute of Cardiac Sciences in Kolkata and the Narayana Hrudayalaya Health City in Bangalore. Currently, Narayana Hrudayalaya Group establishes and manages existing and upcoming health cities in Hyderabad, Jaipur, Jamshedpur, Ahmedabad and a few other cities.
Dr. Shetty and his team pioneered the concept of a “Health City”, a 2000-5000 bedded conglomeration of multiple super specialty hospitals in a single campus. The economies of scale achieved through the health cities enable the Group to provide affordable healthcare to thousands. Dr. Shetty was also involved in coining the term “Micro Health Insurance”. He spearheaded the launch of a health insurance for the farmers of Karnataka in association with the State Government. Yeshaswini, the micro-health insurance scheme, launched eight years ago with a premium of Rs. 5/- per month per person, has revolutionized health insurance in the State. Dr. Shetty actively sought and succeeded in replicating the micro-health insurance model in the neighbouring states of Andhra Pradesh (Arogya Shree) and Tamil Nadu (Kalaignar Star Health Insurance). The huge success of this model has seen six more State Governments opting to adopt a Yeshaswini like micro-health insurance model in their respective States.
The Narayana Hrudayalaya Group, in association with the Indian Space Research Organization, manages the world’s largest telemedicine program and has treated over 53,000 heart patients. The Narayana Hrudayalaya telemedicine facility caters to the PAN-African satellite network which connects 56 African cities. Dr. Shetty has one of the largest experience in the world performing complex heart operations such as Pulmonary Endarterectomy, repair of Aortic Aneurysms and repair of heart valves in adults and new born babies. Twenty years ago, Dr. Shetty and his team pioneered the neo-natal cardiac surgery by operating on a two day old baby with complex congenital heart disease. Since then he and his team have built the world’s largest paediatric cardiac surgical centre at Narayana Hrudayalaya Health City, Bangalore, which attract patients from 76 countries. Dr. Devi Shetty and his team have performed over 80,000 heart surgeries on adults and children till date.
His activities are extensively profiled in several international publications like the Wall Street Journal, which referred to him as the 'Henry Ford of Cardiac Surgery' in a cover page article, Forbes, Fortune and Business Week. Harvard Business School and Wharton Business School have based a case study on the Narayana Hrudayalaya Group acknowledging its unique affordable healthcare business model. Presently, Narayana Hrudayalaya is involved in building a 300 bed low cost super specialty hospital in Mysore which is expected to change the way high tech healthcare is delivered to the working class and the poor.
Dr. Shetty is a recipient of the Padma Shree in 2003, Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year in 2003, Dr. B.C. Roy award in 2004 and Social Entrepreneur - World Economic Forum in 2005. Dr. Shetty is a Professor at Rajiv Gandhi University of Medical Sciences, Bangalore, India and University of Minnesota Medical School, USA.