Now fungus in IV fluid bottle

Contaminated intravenous glucose units seem to have come to stay in Rajasthan. Following the deaths of 16 pregnant women in Jodhpur in March, three cases of contamination have surfaced in May.

A tragedy was averted at Jaipur’s SMS Hospital on Wednesday when a staff member noticed fungus inside a bottle of intravenous fluid that was to be administered to a patient in the Intensive Care Unit.

“Only one bottle was found to be contaminated,” said Diwakar Patel, Assistant Drug Controller, whose team had collected the samples. “We have stopped the use of the remaining stock that was bought from Gujarat’s Nirlife Health Care Limited,” said Patel. The samples will be sent for tests to the Central Drug Laboratory in Kolkata.

In November 2010, the hospital store had received two installments of 3,750 and 12,083 bottles, the contaminated bottle belonged to this batch. “The stock is almost over,” Patel said.

On May 9, two bottles of contaminated IV fluid were found at the Janana Hospital in the city. The hospital’s pharmacist, Ram Swaroop, noticed the contamination during a sale. Hospital superintendent Dr Shashi Gupta immediately stopped sale of the stock.

On May 20, Devendra Kedawat, drug controller of Bhilwara district, seized 1,174 bottles of intravenous fluid from Mahatma Gandhi Hospital after an infected bottle was detected.

“Infected bottles can cause septicemia (a kind of infection) and lead to death,” said Dr LC Sharma, medical superintendent of the SMS Hospital. Most of the contamination, he said, occurs during transportation and storage.

Principal Secretary (Health) BN Sharma said drug controllers have been directed to seize the whole stock the moment an infected bottle is detected.