Tirupati: Ruia doctor leads anti-Covid fight

Tirupati: As a nodal officer for Covid-19 at Ruia Hospital, Dr S Subba Rao has been in close contact with patients who have infected by the novel coronavirus for almost 12 hours in a day which is longer than his sleeping time for more than two months from now.

A pulmonologist by profession, he was chosen by the government to take over the responsibilities for the most stressful job and trained him at Vijayawada on the Covid-19 treatment protocols.

Discharging multiple responsibilities simultaneously, he trained more than 500 doctors, health and sanitary workers and played a key role in preparing a regiment of medical and health warriors to fight against the deadly virus.

Dr Subba Rao and his team has successfully treated the first positive patient in the district to recover completely and discharged him. "We are also treating other patients with mild symptoms and giving only symptomatic treatment for them. Our teams are available round-the-clock", he told The Hans India.

Apart from guiding the teams at outpatient department which witness about 100-120 cases normally, he needs to send various reports from time to time to district authorities and state authorities and answer their queries. The health condition of inpatients has to be monitored constantly and upload the reports. With all these schedules, he finds little time to take his lunch also.

Wearing the personal protective equipment (PPE) he will go for rounds to see positive patients in isolation and monitor their treatment besides giving them moral strength. When he goes back to home in night, his clothes are to separately soaked in the water for washing.

He has been receiving good cooperation from his wife who is Ophthalmologist at Ruia hospital itself. Amidst these tensions and work pressures, they worry very much for their son who is doing MS in the USA, where the situation is very critical.

As doctors also becoming victims of coronavirus, they need to be more cautious while examining the patients. "Of course, we do have some fear that we may get infected by the virus. But its only about five per cent when we go to the positive patient. But after coming out of them, we come to the routine," he explained.