Public Health Laboratory to come up in Valliyoor on an outlay of ₹1 crore

After getting a District Headquarters Government Hospital, Valliyoor is all set to get a round the clock Public Health Laboratory on an outlay of ₹1 crore which will be a vital cog in the Department of Public Health’s disease surveillance programme.

The upcoming clinical lab, to be established with Union government’s assistance, will be a boon to patients coming from Valliyoor, Radhapuram, Thisaiyanvilai, Nanguneri, Kalakkad and Pazhavoor since a range of microbiological, biochemistry and pathology investigations can be done here.

Hence, the lab is expected to play a vital role in prevention and control of epidemic-prone diseases.

The lab will provide services such as stool culture, blood culture, operation theatre swab analysis, bacteriological analysis of drinking water, serology / ELISA for dengue, chikungunya, viral hepatitis (A and E), measles, leptospirosis, scrub typhus etc., sources in the Department of Public Health said.

Since this town is situated on the busy Kanniyakumari – Kashmir highway and hence witnesses accidents quite often, the victims can be rushed to the district headquarters hospital planned on the western side of Valliyoor.

Since the lab cannot function as a standalone facility, it is coming up near the hospital.

The public health laboratory will have at least a microbiologist, a lab technician and a lab attendant.

Apart from getting samples from the district headquarters hospital, it will also receive samples taken from patients visiting primary health centres in the region.

Moreover, laboratory technicians will visit the field to collect samples from patients in the event of outbreak of any disease in a particular area. The technicians will have to visit the wards of the district headquarters government hospital regularly to detect clustering of cases in any particular area and monitor daily admission of cases of fever, diarrhoea, jaundice, etc.

If clustering of cases is found in any particular place, it will immediately be notified to the public health authorities concerned for appropriate and early intervention. They should also give early warnings of impending outbreaks in any area based on influx of patients to prevent the outbreak before the situation gets worse.