French girl who suffered smoke injuries on ventilator support

NEW DELHI: Twenty three-year-old Anklora from France was taken to the casualty ward of Safdarjung hospital at around 7 am in an unconscious condition. She had suffered

NEW DELHI: Twenty three-year-old Anklora from France was taken to the casualty ward of Safdarjung hospital at around 7 am in an unconscious condition. She had suffered from smoke inhalation injury, injuries to the lungs and airways because of the smoke during a fire.

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The doctors had to perform a pre-emptive intubation, a procedure to place a plastic tube inside the trachea to help a patient breathe.

“The procedure had to be done immediately or the case might have worsened. Later it would have been difficult to intubate her, had the airway closed due to fluid accumulation,” said the doctor on duty, who did not want to be named.

She was then put on a ventilator in the respiratory intensive care unit (ICU) of the hospital.

“After her condition stabilised a little, she was transferred to Apollo hospital,” said Poonam Shanda, hospital spokesperson. At around 1 pm, she was still on a ventilator and was transported to Apollo hospital in a ventilator-equipped ambulance.

Sources from Apollo hospital said that the girl was in critical condition and was dependent on ventilator. “The next 24 hours are critical for her,” the source said.

Another man, Gaurav Taneja, 37, who was with Anklora was declared dead on arrival to the burns casualty and was taken straight to the mortuary at Safdarjung hospital, where a post-mortem would be done.