"During the active beating of the heart, the cuffs are deflated so the blood pumped by the heart can go down the arteries of the legs. When the heart relaxes, the cuffs rapidly inflate from bottom to top (ankles or pelvis) or "counter" to normal flow and the 'counterpulsation' forces blood back up the arteries and into the heart arteries," the Mumbai-based doctor said.

The standard course of 35-day treatment involves hour-long sittings five days a week, which costs around Rs 70,000.

"When many centres come up with this therapy, the cost will go down and the procedure treatment will also be reduced," Dr Punjabi said.

The idea for this treatment process initiated 50 years back. However, the treatment did not find relevance because the equipments were not effective and it was very cumbersome, the doctor said.

"The equipments are also costly and it requires constant supervision of a cardiologist and a physician," Dr Punjabi said.

At present, there are around 40 EECP machines installed in India. "There are four to five machines in Mumbai itself.

America has 600, there are 300 machines in Europe and around 20,000 in China," the cardiologist added.