Bangkok ER staff struggle to get a 150 kilo lady to hospital
Emergency medical workers for Bangkok’s Kluaynamthai Hospital spent most of Friday attempting to remove a 150 kilogram (330 pound) woman from her shack in one of the city’s poorest neighborhoods, Klong Toey.
Rattanaporn Polthep, 25, needed to get wounds on her back checked. She has been bedridden, cannot walk, and can hardly move. Her family feared the wounds were worsening and no one in the family could check them since they could not move her.
She must have not left the shack in a long time, since she could not fit through the door. Medical workers cut open the shack’s gypsum walls to remove her. The next issue came when they realized they did not have a stretcher large enough to accommodate her weight. They also needed to park the ambulance 800 meters from the shack since it is down a footpath that could not accommodate a vehicle. Eventually, many workers took shifts carrying her a few steps at a time to the waiting vehicle. From there, they got her to the nearby hospital’s third-floor ward. Though her weight is not that high for some Western nations where obesity is common, it’s unusually high for Thailand and the medical field is not yet well-equipped to deal with larger patients.
Rattanaporn told the press assembled at the hospital that she gained much of her weight over the past two years — and that the culprits are sweets and desserts. She lost the ability to walk after a collapse in October, and any attempt is extremely painful. Dr. Thaweesak Phuriwetkhunakorn, a hospital surgeon, planned to give her an X-ray to see if she was suffering from a broken leg or ankle. He also confirmed that she has high blood pressure and heart disease. He noted that treatment would take a long time due to her weight and that she needs to learn new eating habits. The distressing scenario that unfolded on Friday follows comments just last month by the president of the Diabetes Association of Thailand, who said Thai women were the second-heaviest in Southeast Asia. Coconuts Bangkok
