Representatives of 452 hospitals and laboratories from the 15 zones participated in an emergency meeting organised by the Chennai Corporation on Thursday.
The total number of persons admitted with symptoms of dengue since October 1 is 21. Hospitals have reported eight cases of dengue in the last two days.
The civic body has put in place a system whereby all the 596 registered hospitals and 36 diagnostic laboratories in the city are required to provide details of the patients on a daily basis to the Chennai Corporation. The meeting on Thursday was headed by the zonal-level assistant health officers in each of the zones.
As part of the efforts to cope with the challenges pertaining to spread of dengue in the city, the civic body has asked hospitals to commence reporting of all suspected cases of dengue on the same day. Under the existing system most of the hospitals were found to report diseases only after the confirmation of the tests is done. The civic body on Thursday directed all the hospitals and diagnostic laboratories to take efforts to streamline the process of direct reporting of suspected cases of dengue.
Starting Friday, teams of health officials will rush to any locality with suspected cases and remove peri-domestic sources of breeding such as tyres, organic waste etc said an official of the Chennai Corporation. Malaria, plague, cerebrospinal fever, cholera, tuberculosis, epidemic influenza, chikungunya, tetanus and rabies are among diseases or conditions also on the list that must be reported by the hospitals.
All the 15 zonal assistant health officers have asked the hospitals in their respective zones to commence fogging operations on their premises on a weekly basis. The hospitals with suspected dengue patients have also been directed to use mosquito nets for each patient to prevent spread of dengue through mosquito bite at hospital. Starting Friday, the civic body will strictly monitor such measures by hospitals. The hospitals and diagnostic laboratories have been asked to make optimum use of the system to tackle dengue.
Chennai Corporation Commissioner D. Karthikeyan said the hospitals have been sensitised. “We will monitor the hospitals and diagnostic laboratories,” he said. Most of the 21 hospitals in Tiruvottiyur, 7 in Manali, 11 in Madhavaram, 45 in Ambattur, 19 in Valasaravakkam, 28 in Alandur, 19 in Perungudi and 9 in Sholinganallur participated in the meeting on Thursday.
Based on the minutes of the meeting in all the zones on Thursday, the civic body is planning to devise more efficient methods to track public health on a daily basis and take quick remedial measures.
All the measures to prevent the spread of dengue will be taken even before the hospital received results of medical tests for a suspected patient of dengue, said an official. The civic body has also started distribution of 2 lakh pamphlets in vulnerable localities.
A total of 25 schools have been covered in the awareness campaign in the past two days.
