Santhosh's ramblings

There are a few very sick patients in ICU as of now. One man, in his 50’s who came into causality and arrested there, possibly due to intra-cerebral bleed. The admitting doctor did an excellent job in resuscitating and putting him on the ventilator. But the patient due to the underlying disease situation, was already brain dead. He is now on ventilator for the past 4 days. The family wants him kept alive, because the daughter’s marriage is coming up in the next few days. If the father dies or any death happens in the family, no marriage can take place for more than one year. And the extended family wants to avoid this complexity. And we have been requested to make it sure that he remains “alive” till the marriage is over. There is another man, in his 40’s who is in and out of supportive ventilation after a pesticide ingestion. Though he wanted to take his life, today he wants to get out of ventilator soon. But as and when his wife comes in, his attitude changes – he gets angry...

We see every day on an average, one to two suicide attempts. A few years back what we would have seen was primarily young girls, or recently married girls coming in with suicide attempts. And the issues which they faced had some commonality. Stories of dowry, in laws , and other gender related issues. Today what we see is a totally different profile. Sometime later I will try to share the detailed demographics, but for this ramblings – a broad capturing of some profiles are being used. We have seen children as young as 8 to 9 years and elderly as old as in the 70s with stories of varied issues which has led them to explore a quick way out of this world. We still see a few women with gender related family issues who come with suicide attempts, but much less than what it was.   In an era when we are projecting our nation as the next destination for the world, the next economic super power, a world leader for many of the issues which the world faces today, for some of us, who...