NE HEALTH BUREAU
CHENNAI, MAR 5
Thanks to a medical miracle, a 20-year-old worker, who fell from the 17th-floor of a construction site at Perungudi on OMR Road, Chennai got a new lease of life.
A team of dedicated specialists headed by Dr. Roopesh Kumar, Senior Consultant & Neurosurgeon, Dr Pratheema Ramachandran, and Dr. Devachandran Jayakumar, Critical care Consultants of Apollo Specialty Hospitals OMR gave a new lease of life to the worker who suffered multiple trauma complications.
Addressing the reporters, Dr Roopesh Kumar said, “M.D Firoj Alam, an air condition mechanic, was working at a major construction site in Perungudi. On the 9th of December 2020, Firoj accidentally fell from the 17th-floor landing on the fifth floor of the building, he had sustained multiple injuries in his body.
He was rushed to Apollo Specialty Hospitals, OMR for emergency treatment within 10 minutes from the accident site.
He was brought in an unresponsive state, with breathing problems, extreme hypotension, and bleeding from the head, mouth, ears, and nose, and both his legs had exposed bones.
The doctors at the Emergency Medical Care Department immediately secured his airway and started artificial respiration; treating his hypotension with blood transfusion and IV fluids.
Once he was relatively stable, a whole-body trauma series CT scan was done which revealed severe traumatic brain injury with blood clots in his occipital lobes, multiple facial fractures, Cervical spine fracture, liver and right kidney injuries with hemoperitoneum, and both lower limb bone fractures (compound).
Later he was shifted to ICU for further medical management.
The doctors’ team managed the patient’s multiple injuries in a strategically phased manner avoiding further complications.
Dr. Roopesh Kumar said, “We immediately sedated and paralysed him to make his condition more stable. We performed a tracheostomy to facilitate ventilation and administered medications to reduce brain swelling. Once his blood pressure got stabilised, his leg fractures were fixed through surgeries by orthopaedic surgeons and plastic surgeons. A team of urologists and gastroenterologists managed his liver and kidney injuries through non-operative procedures”.
Dr. Pratheema Ramachandran and Dr. Devachandran Jayakumar, Critical care Consultants said, “Subsequently, his damaged facial bones were surgically corrected by the Faciomaxillary surgeon. His intermittent fever spikes were managed with antibiotics as per the guidance of the infectious disease consultant. Later, he was shifted to the rehabilitation unit and we continued with physiotherapy, speech, and swallowing therapy. As his conscious level regained, he was behaving very aggressively with severe mood swings. This was managed by psychiatrist and neuropsychologist and he got normalized gradually.”
Post all the procedures the patient had significant stiffness of all four limbs which was becoming an obstacle to his rehabilitation. He was administered multiple spinal intrathecal injections of centrally acting muscle relaxants along with oral medications which aided in reducing the stiffness making it pliable for walking.
After nearly two months of intensive care management, multiple surgical procedures, various medications, physiotherapy, speech therapy, cognitive therapy, rehabilitation, and excellent nursing care, Firoz is all set to get back to his native town along with his father who was a support to him throughout this period.
