After meeting city’s requirements, oxygen-on-wheels to move to Taluks 

Mysore/Mysuru: Oxygen on wheels is the new reality and the six oxygen-on-wheels (buses converted into vehicles carrying Liquid Medical Oxygen) are doing yeomen service to the city by ensuring that the life-saving gas reaches the patient on time and at any hour of the day. 

Now, as the city is self-sufficient with thousands of jumbo cylinders straight from the refilling plants and many oxygen concentrators purchased by the Government and also donated by voluntary organisations and philanthropists, the oxygen-on-wheels will move to Taluks of Mysuru. 

The biggest struggle that patients and their relatives face is finding beds, with many seen gasping for air in vehicles outside hospitals. The purpose of such buses is to stabilise the health condition of virus-infected patients requiring emergency oxygen support. These modified buses have proved a boon to many COVID-infected patients who are having breathlessness and desperately require oxygen.

The buses are stationed in front of hospitals and medical facilities offering COVID care. If the patients are unable to get the bed in the facilities, they can board the bus and remain until they get a bed in that particular facility or another hospital. Transportation is free. 

A boon to patients 

“Each bus has been fitted with eight oxygen cylinders and two oxygen concentrators. If there is unusual crowd at the screening centre, the patients can comfortably wait in the buses with oxygen support. And they can also be shifted either to their homes, COVID Care Centres or hospitals based on their medical conditions,” Mysuru City Corporation (MCC) Commissioner Shilpa Nag told Star of Mysore  this morning. 

Of the six oxygen-on-wheels, four are from Karnataka State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC) and two have been donated by Agarwal Samaj. Family members of the patients sometimes fail to establish contacts with the COVID War Room and therefore take the patients to the hospital directly creating further burden on the hospital. The six oxygen-on-wheels in Mysuru has eased this problem. 

Not only this, the oxygen-on-wheels has helped shift patients from COVID Care Centres to diagnostic centres to get patient CT scan and other medical tests done. Patients are made to sleep inside the bus and they can wait for their turn and effortlessly inhale the life-saving gas. The buses also doubled up as ambulances when critical patients had to be shifted from care facilities to ICUs in the non-availability of ambulances at that particular time. 

Service in Taluks

“Mysuru city is self-sufficient now and we have many cylinders for use and also for back-up. We have many oxygen concentrators donated by kind-hearted individuals. Earlier, the scene was different with lack if beds and oxygen. As such we have decided to move all the six oxygen-on-wheels to Taluks,” Shilpa Nag said. 

A meeting was held yesterday where the MCC Commissioner informed the District Health Officer (DHO) Dr. T. Amarnath that the buses can be shifted to Taluks where they can be stationed in front of rural COVID Care Centres. 

DHO Dr. Amarnath said that the oxygen-on-wheels will be put to maximum use in rural areas. “We have a requirement and the location of the buses will be decided after taking into consideration the oxygen-supply infrastructure in Taluks and also the number of patients who need support,” he said.