UP: Over 85% Covid positive patients have at least one comorbid condition

LUCKNOW: In an assessment undertaken by the state medical education department over 85% of the Covid-19 patients undergoing treatment at the state medical colleges were found to be suffering with at least one comorbid condition.
“This has added immensely to the challenge of extending quality care to patients. Doctors have to treat associated disorders along with Covid-19 which makes monitoring extremely rigorous,” said additional chief secretary, medical education, Dr Rajneesh Dube.
Experts said that comorbidity refers to the existence of multiple medical conditions in the same person. “Comorbid conditions like diabetes, hypertension, cardiac ailments, renal diseases, etc, not only prolongs a patient’s stay in the hospital, they retard recovery process as the body has too many things to handle,” explained Dr SNS Yadav, former CMO Lucknow and specialist in renal diseases.
Trends from the state surveillance team indicate that diabetes was the commonest co-morbidity seen in Covid-19 patients followed by hypertension and cardiac ailments. Sources said that about 25% of the patients had more than one co-morbid condition.
Officials said that efforts were being made to provide additional work force to the medical colleges in wake of the rising load. “To meet the requirement, the National Health Mission has been asked to spare a certain group of people for medical colleges. Then, we also liberalized the discharge policy for mild and moderate patients to accelerate the cycle of admissions and discharges,” said Dr Dube.
Meanwhile, 4,186 new Covid-19 cases were reported in the state in the past 24 hours, taking the total to 1,58,701. As per health bulletin, 41.6 % (or 1742) of the total cases came from just seven districts, including Lucknow (595), Kanpur (429), Varanasi (198), Ballia (155) Prayagraj (144), Lakhimpur Kheri (116) and Moradabad (105).
Officials stated that 4,376 persons were discharged from hospitals, leaving the state with 50,893 cases of active infection. The state also recorded a total of 69 deaths, taking the total to 2,515.
Kanpur, which tops the list of Covid casualties, saw ten deaths which took the district total to 309. Lucknow and Moradabad followed next with eight and six deaths respectively.