Rally held to create awareness about Lupus

Bhubaneswar: Awareness about Lupus, a little-known ailment which mostly afflicts women of child bearing age, is the key to fight the complex disease, experts said at a rally held here to mark World Lupus Day on Tuesday.

Lupus is an auto-immune disease which mimics the symptoms of many other ailments confusing both the physician and the patient, speakers said at the rally organised by the Department of Immunology and Rheumatology of the Institute of Medical Sciences and SUM Hospital.

“It is a complex health issue and it causes more problems than ten different diseases can do together,” Prof. (Dr.) Pusparaj Samantasinhar, medical superintendent of the hospital, said.

But proper diagnosis and treatment can help fight the disease, he said.

Lupus or SLE is a disease which normally affects young females which can involve any parts of the body. Among 10 lupus patients, 9 are females. Most common symptoms are long standing fever, photo sensitive rash over the face, hair loss,low hemoglobin/platelet, pain & swelling of joints and swelling of foot due to leakage of protein in the urine. Other symptoms such as seizure/fits, psychiatric symptoms, deposition of fluids in the chest cavity, muscle weakness and many more symptoms, Prof. (Dr.) Pradipta Sekhar Patro, Head of the department of Immunology and Rheumatology, said.

Doctors, nurses and medical students of IMS and SUM Hospital took part in the rally and went in a procession from the Master Canteen square up to Ram Mandir which was flagged-off by Ashok Chandra Panda, Odisha’s minister of state for Science and Technology, Public Enterprises and Social Security and Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities in presence of the local MLA Ananta Narayan Jena. SOA’s dean (Students’ Welfare) Prof. Jyoti Ranjan Das and nursing superintendent of IMS and SUM Hospital Minati Mishra were present.

A special sand art was done by eminent sand artist Sudarshan Patnaik to mark the occasion.

The disease was later discussed at a seminar organised at the hospital under the Continuing Medical Education (CME) programme in which Prof. (Dr.) Gangadhar Sahoo, pro-vice chancellor of SOA and dean of IMS and SUM Hospital, Prof. (Dr.) Samantasinhar and Prof. (Dr.) Patro participated. It was attended by doctors and medical students.