LAHORE, April 4: At least 11 patients in the neurosurgery ward of Jinnah Hospital suffered `strong pyrogen reaction` leading to high fever and abnormal shivering shortly after they were administered drug through intravenous infusion, Dawn has learnt.

The drug reaction stirred panic among the patients and their attendants. Pyrogen reaction is a side-effect of intravenous infusion of solution administered to patients.

The Jinnah Hospital administration seized all batches of the drug and withdrew it from other wards as well.

The bitter memory of the Punjab Institute of Cardiology (PIC) drugs reaction has hardly been erased from the memory of people when another issue has surfaced. The inquiry into the PIC scam, which claimed 150lives, is yet to be completed.

The incident has once again brought to the fore the issue of quality of institutional drugs being supplied to the state-run hospitals in the province. Most patients visit the public-sector health facilities for `free treatment`.

A source said on-duty doctors in the evening shift prescribed the drug to the patients in the post-operative care. Shortly after the infusion of the prescribed drug, the patients started shivering and the attendants could not manage them.

The staff alerted the senior doctors and other admin officials. Several security guards, ward boys and other hospital employees were called to assist the patients.

Later, the senior doctors prescribed medicines to the patients who were brought to stable condition in a few hours. Some of the affected patients were still in a critical condition.

The source said the medicine administered to the patients in the neurosurgery department was issued from the hospital stock.

A doctor explained that generally reaction meant temperature with minor attack of shivering with the onset of infusion. In the neurosurgery ward, he said, the patients suffered a strong reaction withfits, rigours, massive shivering and high-grade fever. The reaction might be due to use of sterilising chemical, he suspected.

All the 11 patients were operated the same day and administered IV infusion as they were not on oral medication, he said.

Allama Iqbal Medical College/Jinnah Hospital chief executive Prof Dr Javed Akram confirmed the incident, saying an inquiry committee headed by Professor of Medicine Prof Dr Zafar Iqbal Chaudhry had been constituted to probe the matter. Other members on the committee are Prof Dr Hafiz Ijaz Ahmad, Assistant Professor Dr Ali Jawa and Pharmacist DrBalquees Aziz.

Prof Javed further said instructions had been issued to inform the company supplying suspected drugs to the Jinnah Hospital and dispatch the samples of the used drug(s) to the Drug Testing Laboratory.

`We have seized the batches of the used drips and other suspected drugs and directed the doctors and other officials concerned to stop using or prescribing them till further orders,` he said.

He said it was not Jinnah Hospital alone as some other teaching institutions in the provincial capital were using the same set of drugs. They had informed other health facilities about the drug reaction, he said.