MUMBAI: Considering the increase in Covid-19 cases in Mumbai, BMC on Wednesday issued revised guidelines for home isolation of patients. It also listed out specific warning signs to watch out for immediate hospital transfer of patients under home isolation.
BMC has also asked its officers to ensure that home-isolated patients monitor their health and take treatment for the infection from their family physician and continue their regular treatment for comorbidities, if any.
The list of warning signs that would need hospital admission includes difficulty in breathing, oxygen saturation below 95% on fingertip pulse oximeter, a persistent fever of 100.4 or higher for more than 24 hours, persistent pain or pressure in the chest, cough, hypoxic on mild exertion such as a six-minute walk test and climbing one or two flights of stairs, mental confusion or inability to wake up, slurred speech, seizures, weakness or numbness in any limb or face, bluish discolouration of lips or face, signs of onset of any organ dysfunction such as hypotension, drowsiness and kidney dysfunction. BMC has also said home-isolated patients should restrict their movement within their residence too.
They also should regularly inform their health status to the tele-monitoring team, medical officer, family doctor or BMC officers who have been asked to note down the names of the physician. A dedicated team of civic staff must do a random check of 10% of patients daily to find whether he or she is violating home isolation rules.
A medical officer from a civic ward said the revised guidelines circular goes beyond reiterating what was being followed so far to include specific warning signs to watch out for in asymptomatic or mildly symptomtic patients.
“Patients receive an IVR call daily and are required to respond to the call as it is from BMC and for the patient’s own benefit. In view of the rising cases, we cannot afford to miss out on looking out for warning signs in patients. If these are not addressed on time, the patient’s condition could deteriorate,” he said.