KOLKATA: A 26-year-old pregnant woman, who developed a rare and life-threatening condition—HELLP syndrome (haemolysis, elevated liver enzyme, low platelet count)—was treated at R G Kar Medical College and Hospital for about two months and finally sent home, cured though she lost her child. Pooja Singh from Rishra had to spend 25 days in the critical care unit for the condition that affects only 0.5%-0.9% pregnancies.
In her 35th week of pregnancy, the homemaker was referred to RG Kar on August 12 with severe pregnancy-induced hypertension. She was admitted under the care of gynaecology head Arup Majhi and gynaecologist Rupali Modak. Singh was in shock with un-recordable BP, severe anaemia and renal shutdown. The foetus was found without cardiac activity. The two doctors, along with anaesthetist Mandira Goho took the dead foetus out. Singh was shifted to CCU, where a team under critical care medicine physician Sugata Dasgupta took over. Diagnosed with HELLP syndrome, Singh’s organs had started failing and she developed pneumonia and surgical-wound infection, due to which she went into septic shock several times. Aggressive critical care, including 15 days of invasive mechanical ventilation, blood product transfusions and 23 sessions of haemodialysis, brought her back from the brink. Dasgupta had deployed a team comprising doctors Pradip Dey, Soujanya Das, Dipanjan Dawn, Tathagata Mondal, Partha Sardar, Biswajit Biswas, Debomita Das, Avisek Pal and Indradip Sanyal. “We are happy we could send her home,” said Dasgupta.