Animal Bite Management Practices: Study at Three Municipal Corporation Hospitals of Ahmedabad

Context: Rabies is a deadly Zoonotic disease most often transmitted to humans through a dog bite. Most of these deaths could be prevented through post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP), including immediate wound washing, rabies immunoglobulin administration and vaccination. Aims: To study attitude and pre-treatment practices among the study population. Methods: Cross sectional study was carried out by conducting exit interview of 100 cases of animal bite each from three hospitals run by Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation. Observations: Total 300 cases of animal bites were studied in the present study. Most common biting animal was dog as 97.33% cases gave history of dog bite. Almost half of the cases belonged to age group less than 20 years with mean age of 19+ 20.2 years and male to female ratio was 3:1. Right lower limb was the most common (45.7%) biting site and majority (59%) had category III bites. Immediate pre-treatment of wound was practiced by 72% of cases before visiting hospitals however only 5.7% had gone for immediate washing of wound with soap and water. The local applications at the site of bite were tobacco snuff, red chilli, turmeric, and miscellaneous things like Garlic, Jaggery, Kerosene, Lime, Bandage, Soframycine, Ghee, Wheat flour etc. which were practiced by 66% of cases. The average time interval between bite and visiting the hospital was 32 hours. Conclusions: With the availability of safe and effective tissue culture vaccines prevention of rabies is virtually assured by immediate and appropriate post exposure treatment. There is need for creating awareness in public and medical community about proper wound management, judicious use of anti-rabies serum and use of modern tissue culture vaccine after animal bite.