July to September 2017

Wow Bountiful rains through September, the tanks have started filling up and the valley is green and lush. What hope in the air for all the farmers, daily wage workers, shepherds all those who make up our clientele
Busy as usual
 A Total of 7053 patients over the 3 month period
Children 248 M and 259 F
Elderly: 823 M and 850 F
Adults: 2012 M and 2861 F

Dr Kartik had been invited to give a guest lecture at his Alma Mater Institute of Aerospace Medicine, Bengaluru. It was a fun event giving back to the Institution.

April - June 2017

The hot months of summer brings a certain lassitude! We had quite a few patients with heat exhaustion, mainly the older people. A few young ones also. The waiting area though shaded is in the open, so heat load is high. Fans, earthen water pots (matkas) alleviate the heat to some extent.

As usual a large number of patients
4192 patients, 244 children and 750 elderly contributed to the load.

Everyone is waiting for the rains, fields lying fallow, the heat baking
The RHC closes for a summer break in May so all patients are covered till we get back.

Just a look at the NCD data over 01 years: Mind boggling

Hypertension: 6857

Diabetes: 9029

Hypothyroids: 469

Jan to March 2017

Wow its hot, March has been sizzling. Temperatures upwards of 38 Celsius and working in the heat in the mid afternoons - phew!!! Patients sit uncomplainingly

Lots of patients: 6968 of them, with the majority earning less than 48000 pa.
475 children below the ages of 15 and 981 elderly patients.

The drought has also affected the earning capacity. The effects of demonetisation are slowly fading though.

April promises to be hot as well

The year past saw us cover 22742 patients, an increase of 5% from the last year. Quality affordable outpatient medical care is so much needed. Almost 95% of illnesses could be treated at an outpatient level. The need is to have dedicated doctors and staff in rural areas. I frankly do not see it happening given the way our medical education is structured.

 This young girl had an extra orbital pseudo tumour which caused ptosis of the left eye. She was operated at Hyderabad and is slowly recovering.

 This old lady, with Hypertension, Stroke and Diabetes makes a trek of almost 40 km to reach the RHC. She has to change 3 buses to reach. We were able to help her with some transportation charges so is now able to hire an auto. She comes once in 4 months for a review.

 Young man with Congenital Hypothyroidism. Mis diagnosed and Mistreated - literally abandoned by his parents. Slowly brought under control. I suspect that he has other endocrine deficiencies too.
















Diabetic feet are so common - lack of foot care, injuries due to bare foot walking, poor nutrition all add up to this debilitating condition. Loss of earning capacity adds to the woes of the patients.

Throngs of patients. This was at 1700 having seen an OP of 180 patients

This young girl with type 1 Diabetes - is an aspiring state Basketball player. She made it up to the semifinals in the recently conducted nationals at Rajnandgaon. However she could not make the cut. Wondering whether her illness precluded her selection. 

She is well controlled on Insulin and has excellent parental support.

That's all for now folks. Looking forward to a break in May

Oct - Dec 2016

The final quarter of the year.
The first two week sof November saw the RHCtake a short break.
As usual the NE monsoon played out as a damp squib!. Cyclone Vardah deposied some 4 cm of rain and that's it
The month of December saw soms poor patient attendance primarily due to the cash crunch post demonetisation. However by the end o December things were looking up once again.

Total of 5366 patients
Children below 15: Males - 244 and Females - 174
Elderly (Above 65): Males - 338 and Females - 341
Adults: 1820 Males and 2449 females

Income Levels: 5101 earned less than INR 48000 pa and 265 were over 48000 pa