No emergency medical care at city's Metro stations

No metro station in Bengaluru, other than the one at Majestic, provides emergency medical facilities to travellers. With Namma Metro seeing an average daily ridership of 3.2 lakh, there is an urgent need for emergency medical care at the city’s 40 metro stations.

Following cases of medical emergencies at metro stations in Delhi, medical assistance has been provided by the metro staff on trains and medical counters have been set up at the stations.

But the Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation Limited (BMRCL) is yet to adopt it. BMRCL spokesperson U A Vasanth Rao said: “Over a period of time, we will provide the medical centres or assistance at the stations.”

He continued: “Medical emergency can’t be understood unless the patient’s history is known.

Hence, we don’t do any first aid treatment. We immediately call the ‘108’ ambulance and our staff help the patient. As of now, we have paramedical staff and an ambulance at the Majestic metro station.”

‘Medical centre must’

When the metro is already having a high ridership which will only to increase in the future, it is time to have a medical centre at all the stations, according to doctors.

Dr Venkatesh A N, Head of Department, Emergency Medicine, Apollo Hospitals, said: “Metro stations see a high movement of people. Thousands of senior citizens and children use the metro. Medical centres with paramedical staff should be available at the stations to attend to medical emergencies.”

According to the doctor, the stations and trains are highly crowded areas and anything can happen at any time.

“The common problem in these stations are breathing difficulties and heart-related emergencies like cardiac arrest and stroke. An automated external defibrillator (AED) should be mandated on the trains and stations since it is a small device which can be used by anybody to treat cardiac diseases,” he explains.

He also suggested that the metro staff be trained in first aid.