The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

HEALTH

Precautions to avoid dengue
Our Correspondent

Symptoms

* Onset of sudden high fever
* Severe headache, pain behind the eyes, pain in the muscles and joints
* Bleeding can occur from nose, gum, mouth or skin bruising, vomiting, black stools, severe pain in abdomen, excessive thirst, pale and cold skin.

Precautions

* Wear full-sleeved clothes and long dresses
* Repellent, coils and electric vapour mats should be used even during day-time
* Aspirin and brufen should be avoided and paracetamol should be given as per medical advice
* Patient should drink ample fluids.

Ludhiana, September 24
The post-monsoon season is always an ordeal for the city residents as it is the time when the dengue fever spreads its wings. Last year also, hundreds of patients of dengue sought treatment at various hospitals and private clinics in the city.

Dr Sandeep Puri, Reader, Department of Medicine Dayanand Medical College and Hospital (DMCH) revealed that in DMCH alone, 102 patients of dengue were given treatment.

“The fever is caused by the bite of tiny mosquito “Aedes agypti”, which becomes active in post monsoon phase. The mosquito which bites only in the early morning or late afternoon, has white stripes on the back and survives only for two to three weeks”, said Dr Puri.

Main symptoms of dengue are sudden high fever, severe headache, pain behind the eyes which worsens with the eye movement and pain in muscles and joints.

Dengue hemorrhagic fever is a severe form of dengue and can be life threatening. The symptoms include bleeding and sometimes shock also occurs, said Dr Puri. He also warned that it could be serious in children and bleeding always occurred 2-3 days after the fever.”High fever for two-three days, frequent vomiting with or without blood, black stools like coal tar, severe and continues pain in abdomen, bleeding from the nose, mouth and gums or skin bruising, excessive thirst, pale and cold skin are the main symptoms”, said Dr Puri.

To prevent the mosquito bite, certain precautionary measures should be taken. One should wear full-sleeved clothes and long dresses. Mosquito Repellent, coils, electric vapour mats should be used even during day-time. Mosquito nets should be used. It is important to break the mosquito-human-mosquito cycle by protecting the infected individual. Early and prompt treatment should be taken and infected individual should avoid taking aspirin and brufen tablets and the patient should drink lot of fluids.

The breeding places for mosquitoes are stored or exposed water collection systems like barrels, jars, drums, pots, buckets, flower vases, plant saucers, tanks, tyres, water coolers, closets and dark places indoors and shaded outside places.

For the prevention of dengue, one should drain out water from coolers, tanks, barrels and drums. The water-containing objects from the courtyards of the house should be removed. All water containers should be covered.

Dr Sandeep Puri, however said few complications could occur during dengue fever, which could be dealt effectively with the timely treatment. He said, “The platelet count of the patient can fall drastically, in that case, platlet rich transfusion should be given. Platelets help in clotting of the blood whenever bleeding occurs from any site”.

Echocardiography academy becomes functional
Our Correspondent

Ludhiana, September 24
The state unit of the Indian Medical Association (IMA) in its endeavour to increase the academic standards of the medicos in Punjab has inaugurated a first of its kind, Academy of Echocardiography. The decision to form this academic forum was taken in the recently held state council meeting here.

Dr R.P. Singh was appointed the Director of the new academy and will provide the study materials and conduct lectures. Dr T.S. Kler, Dr R.C. Garg and Dr Gursharan Singh were nominated as chief patron, patron and chairman of the academy, respectively.

The academy was inaugurated by the former founder Vice-Chancellor of Baba Farid University of Health Sciences, Dr L.S. Chawla. Dr S.N. Tiwari, Dr Gurpreet Singh Wander, Dr T.M. Jaison, Dr Amardeep Singh were the guests of honour. The IMA was represented by state president, Dr R.C. Garg, honorary secretary, Dr Surinder Singla, and finance secretary Dr Gursharan Singh.

The aim of the academy is to spread this highly useful technique among doctors in whole of Punjab especially in rural areas. The newer techniques keep on coming in the market and the doctors who do not study these techniques during their curriculum, remain ignorant about them.

Echocardiography is highly useful in diagnosing heart ailments. IMA is also seeking help from DMC and CMC for study and various demonstrations. Echocardiography is a very simple and non-interventional procedure which is carried out simply by putting a probe on the chest and the working and structure appears on the monitor screen. The new technology in advanced machines like Doppler, Harmonics, Stress Echo and 3-D Echocardiography have been able to match many interventional procedures,” stated Dr R.P. Singh, a renowned cardiologist.

The courses will be run on semester system. Two batches will be added every year. The first batch will start from October 15. At the end of the course of six months the students will have to appear in an exam which will be conducted by neutral bodies like CMC, DMC or Escorts Hospital, New Delhi. The IMA, Punjab, is also approaching the Medical Council of India for approving this course and to give credit hours under the continued medical education programme.

Arjun is gymnastics champion
Our Correspondent

Khanna, September 24
The District Ludhiana Gymnastics Championship was organised at Shri Guru Gobind Singh Senior Secondary School here on September 22. The championship was inaugurated by Mr Vinod Vashisht the chief guest of the function.

Mr Boota Singh president of the District Gymnastics Association, thanked the guests and participants.

The results are: In all round championship, Arjun Parsad of A.S. Senior Secondary School Khanna stood first, Gurmeet Singh and Sukhjeet Singh both of A.S. Senior Secondary School stood second and third, respectively.

In team championship, the team of A. S. Senior Secondary School stood first, while the team of St Joseph’s School Stood second.

In under-19 years boys, Arjun Parsad, Robin Vij and Sukhjeet of A.S. Senior Secondary School Khanna finished first, second and third, respectively, in the floor exercise.

In girls under twelve-12 years the team championship award was won by R.S. Model Senior Secondary School, Shastri Nagar, while S.S.S. Gobind Nagar, Ludhiana, and Joseph’s School, Ludhiana, finished second and third respectively.

All round best gymnast award for under-12 category was bagged by Inderjit Kaur.