The death of a nine-year-old boy, reportedly because of dengue, has come to the notice of Rangareddy District Medical and Health Officer (DMHO). Officials said that as per procedure, ‘death audit’ will be conducted to ascertain if the death was caused by dengue. The nine-year-old boy is from Madinaguda, Miyapur.
A committee comprising DMHO, District Malaria Officer, epidemiologist and others will collect medical case history of the deceased. They will go through the details such as test performed to declare dengue, when was the diagnosis performed, treatment provided to the patient. Case-sheet of the person will be collected from the hospital where the deceased was treated. While 892 cases were reported across the State from June 1 to August 23, no deaths were reported.
Rangareddy’s DMHO Dr K.V. Swarajya Lakshmi said that though there are high chances of false positive and negative results using Rapid Diagnostic Test, it is being used by some private hospitals to confirm dengue cases, leading to panic among people.
“We have instructed private hospitals not to confirm dengue based on Rapid Diagnostic test which has 27% chances to give false negative or positive results. They were suggested to use Elisa test to confirm dengue on fifth day or later after onset of fever,” Dr Lakshmi said.
Officials in Hyderabad are working out a process to make private hospitals send samples to Institute of Preventive Medicine (IPM) for diagnostic test to confirm dengue. Medical camps are being conducted for early diagnosis of the disease, anti-larvae operations are taken up to avoid breeding of mosquitoes which carry disease or infection-causing parasites or virus.