IRRUA – As a new wave of Lassa Fever Epidemic spread across the country, the Chief Medical Director (CMD) of the Irrua Specialist Teaching Hospital (ISTH), Prof. Sylvanus Okogbenin has stressed the need for members of the public to quickly visit the hospital for Lassa Fever test, if no response after 48 hours of treating fever with anti-malaria drugs.
Prof. Okogbenin who was fielding questions from journalists on the current wave of the virus, declared that almost every Lassa Fever patient will survive if they report early to the hospital, adding that the test and drugs for the treat of the disease, were free.
The CMD disclosed that five patients have died of the disease at the hospital since this year, lamenting that all five were those who reported late.
He said the longest any of the dead patients stayed at the hospital before their death, was two hours.
“Once you have a fever that is unusual, particularly when it is not responding to anti-malaria or antibiotics, after 48 hours present to the hospital. Then you can quickly have diagnosis, and if it is lassa fever you will be treated. Because experiences have shown that when you present early, almost every patient will survive” he emphasized.
He similarly disclosed that the hospital had received 200 lassa patients since the current outbreak, with 26 patients currently on admission at the Lassa Fever Ward, while four are in critical conditions.
He stated that the hospital was better prepared for the outbreak this year than the previous years, as the hospital was now better equipped to manage the disease and other ailments.
“It is the expected time of the year when the outbreak usually occurs. This year is much better than previous years. We are better prepared for the outbreak this time. We have more Personal Protectiveness Equipments. We have more ventilators, more dialysis machines, oxygens, monitors that help us to manage these patients.
“Few days ago I received oxygen plant from the federal government. It is going to help us produce oxygen three times more than our previous capacity”, he said.
On preventive measures, he said: “Lassa fever is real. There are measures to take to prevent the infection. Avoid contact with rats as much as possible. Make sure that the holes where rats enter your houses are blocked.
” Make sure you don’t keep refuses around your houses because the rats will come to those refuses, and then enter your house. Make sure foods are well protected, and when you want to eat left over food boil or reheat the food. That will make sure that the virus or bacteria is killed “.
He also disclosed that the hospital under his watch was growing by leaps and bounds, as many structures, including a brand new 10 bed modern Intensive Care Unit that would be the best in the whole of West Africa, diagnostic centres and others, were being constructed.
