Do you know the founder of ORS?🤔🤒🤕 Yes,Oral Rehydration Solution
July 29 is observed as ORS day in India.
But do you know its history and how it was discovered and most important question is who discovered it?
How did he discover?
During the Bangladesh liberation war, he prepared a solution for rapid rehydration to fight diarrhoea and cholera in refugee camps.
As he was already a part of research in oral rehydration therapy , he prepared this solution to treat people as the intravenous fluids (saline) stocks were running out.
To convince people the new treatment would work, they were told it was an oral form of saline. “The oral solution that we elected to use consisted of 22 gm glucose (as commercial monohydrate), 3.5 gm sodium chloride (as table salt) and 2.5 gm sodium bicarbonate (as baking soda) per liter of water. This was the simplest formula, containing the minimum number of ingredients, previously found to be effective in severely ill patients with cholera,” Dr Mahalanabis wrote.
Today, the WHO recommends a combination of sodium chloride, anhydrous glucose, potassium chloride and Trisodium citrate dihydrate as the ORS formula.
The National Health Portal gives a step-by-step guide to preparing formulation at home as well. Six level teaspoonfuls of sugar (1 spoon = 5 g) and half a level spoonful of salt should be mixed with a litre (five 200-ml cups) of clean water), and stirred until the sugar and salt dissolve.
“The home-made solution is adequate in most cases and is very effective for rehydration,” the National Health Portal says. It cautions: “Be very careful to mix the correct amounts. Too much sugar can make the diarrhoea worse and too much salt can be extremely harmful to the child.”
The ORS solution should be covered and not kept for more than 24 hours, due to the risk of bacterial contamination.
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