Delhi hospitals asked to treat heatstroke patients on priority

The Health Department has directed all hospitals, including private medical clinics and nursing homes, in Delhi to treat patients of heatstroke as emergency patients.
According to officials, the move by the Health Department came after increase in the number of patients complaining of heatstroke due to intense heat wave in Delhi and NCR region.
"All the government hospitals along with private medical institutes and clinics have been asked to treat patients complaining of heatstroke as emergency case and give immediate treatment," a senior official said, adding no hospital should refuse admitting such patients.
The department has directed all the hospitals to ensure necessary arrangements in their emergency departments in the form of cooled areas, manpower, medicines and IV fluids, ice packs, etc.

The department has informed the hospitals and nursing homes that due to persistent high temperature in the national capital in last few days, there is an apprehension of rise in cases of heatstroke.
The official said dehydration should not be taken lightly as it could be fatal, although no cases of causality due to heatstroke has been reported yet.

In the national capital, temperature has soared beyond 45 degrees Celsius and hospitals are overflowing with heatstroke patients showing symptoms like fatigue, weakness, nausea, profuse sweating, rapid pulse, muscle cramps, rapid shallow breathing and paleness of skin.
Even the Health Ministry is likely to come out with an advisory for the first time for all the states on preventive measures to tackle the situation.

Health Ministry officials had yesterday said that the advisory would be for all the states as well as people in general on various "dos and don'ts" to cope up with the extreme conditions.
The Health Department of Delhi Government has also appealed to Delhi Police and general public to make homeless people they see on roads aware about the dangers of exposing themselves to high day-time maximum temperature.