Doctors to citizens: Take steps to swat dengue risk

Hyderabad: With sporadic cases of dengue being reported in some parts of the city and with a spike expected in the coming days because of the monsoon, doctors have advised people to take precautions. The Health department has also issued an advisory for people to follow during the season.

According to doctors in the city, they have been witnessing some dengue cases in different places, including districts and in city like Kukatpally, Toopran, Kamareddy and other places. The doctors say evolution of dengue virus has changed especially after Covid. According to a report published by the Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, the virus has evolved dramatically in the Indian sub-continent. Experts opined the rise in instances of drop in WBC (white blood cells) count among dengue positive cases has become frequent, which fuels its demand.

Doctors have suggested precautions and advised parents to take note of the changes in their children when there is fever. Senior paediatrician Dr Sivaranjani Santosh explained in detail on how parents need to take steps before cases get worse. Parents need to take note of the child when it has fever and any two of the six features like nausea and vomiting, red rash, severe body pains, headache, pain behind eyes, back pain, WBC count starts falling.

“The six warning signs tell us that dengue is getting complicated and you need to go to hospital. Severe stomach pain above the belly button below the ribs, uncontrolled vomiting, bleeding from nose, bleeding more when periods, lethargic, platelet falling rapidly and blood getting thicker, liver becoming big and fluid collecting around lungs and other organs in the body,” said Dr Santosh. The pediatrician said if parents neglect at this point this would proceed into severe dengue. This would result in child going into shock, going into coma, and liver getting damaged. This tells us that it is a severe dengue. Most kids will have fever one to five days; older kids may have back pain and headache. All that the parent needs to do is to give paracetamol. The parent needs to be thorough with first-aid for seizures. Dose should be according to the weight of the baby. Parents need to ensure their baby has good intake of liquids and should take the WHO recommended formula and not ORSL.

Doctors have cautioned parents giving Aspirin, Mafthal, Ibuprofen, as these medicines suppress platelets. In severe cases, in some kids water in blood vessels leaks and child may go into shock because of less blood in the vessels. At this stage platelets start falling so parents need to recognise this and take the child to hospitals, doctors said. Unless platelets are below 10,000 micro litres no platelets are given. Giving platelets at 1.80 lakh micro litres is not advisable. During this stage if the parent does not admit their child, this will be dangerous; children may go into severe dengue.

Dr Madap Karuna of GVK EMRI said larvae control at every place--home, school, college, hospital, institute--was needed. She said a massive education and participation was needed.

Meanwhile, the Health department issued an advisory on Tuesday to the citizens to follow and stay healthy during rains. They have been asked to observe a dry day every Friday in a week to get rid of stagnant water around houses, clean septic tanks to prevent mosquito breeding, maintain drains to prevent stagnation, ensure children wearing clothes which cover their arms.