07:02 AM
The rains that have been falling for several days in the country are already generating consequences on the health of the inhabitants of Medellín, who They are congesting medical services.
The city’s District Personnel reported that the emergencies are saturated, with occupations of 169% in adult services and 134% in children’s services. In the same way, the areas of Adult hospitalization is at 132% and pediatric areas are at 100%.
Based on information from the Ministry of Health, the Office also determined that acute respiratory infections, which may be a consequence of changes in climate due to twinter season are the biggest cause of consultation.
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Congestion is affecting the work of more complex institutions such as the San Vicente Fundación University Hospital, the Neurological Institute of Colombia, the La María Hospital, the Medellín Clinic of the West and the AUNA Clinic of the Americas.
Hence, additionally and due to that same overdemand, according to the Observatory of the Fundamental Right to Personal Health, until this Wednesday, when the report was prepared, 168 patients affiliated with the EPS Savia Salud, Coosalud, Salud Total, Sura and Nueva EPS waiting to be referred to specialties such as orthopedics, psychiatry, internal medicine and cardiology.
Hence the call from the leader of the Health Observatory, Tatiana Giraldo, for “the community to carry out a conscious use of emergency services in the hospital network of the District, recognizing an emergency, an urgency and a pathology that can be attended to by medical consultation, thus favoring the flow of patients in the emergency services.”
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Acute respiratory infections They affect the ears, nose, throat and lungs.but generally they are self-limiting, that is, the same organism ends up regulating itself by what They do not require antibiotics to cure them and they do not usually last more than 15 days and in most cases they can be treated at home.
To stop its spread, it is important to observe the same hygiene and self-care rules that had become widespread in times of the covid-19 pandemic, such as use of face masks if a person feels congested in the nose and respiratory tract as well as with frequent and adequate hand washing.
According to information contained on the website of the Ministry of Health, in the 95% of cases of this type that occur in children are caused by viruses and these are conditions with a good prognosis, so that only a small percentage may suffer complications such as otitis, sinusitis or pneumonia.
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A circumstance similar to the current one was also experienced last December, when emergency room occupancy reached 98%. Although it did not reach the same levels, there was alarm because the Christmas and New Year festivities were approaching, a season that usually has a certain degree of complexity due to the increase in road accidents, poisoning and accidents with gunpowder, as well as hot liquids.
