CHENNAI: On the day of polling, there was an increase in the number of medical emergencies in the state, with several cases of assault and fainting.
According to the data from EMRI Green Health Services, GVK Enterprise that operates the 108 ambulance services for the health department, the rise in number extended to April 20, the next day of polling.
“On April 19, the 108 staff attended to 701 road accident cases, 307 assault cases, and 428 fainting cases. On normal days, the numbers would be somewhere around 720, 225, and 290, respectively,” said Balaji Premnath, marketing head of EMRI Green Health Services, GVK Enterprise.
The 108 received a total of 14,649 calls on April 20 out of which 4,129 were emergency calls. Among those, 2,350 calls were related to shifting of patients from one hospital to another. The top three emergencies were road traffic accidents (852), fainting and falling unconscious together (411), and assault (304).
Selvakumar, the organisation’s state head of operations, said the trend continued even on Sunday. The increase in fainting and unconscious cases could be due to the rise in temperature too, he added.
Senior health department officials said no significant heat wave-related mortality or morbidity cases were reported in the state so far.
The health department has instructed all hospitals to report heat wave related cases. Dr TS Selvavinayagam told TNIE, “Officially, we haven’t received any heat wave-related cases. There were three suspected cases but these patients had other health problems.”
Director of Medical Education Dr J Sangumani said that in case of any such significant emergencies, the medical college hospitals would report to him. So far, no such reports were received, he said.