Summerlike weather marks the end of the school year, the start of camping season, an opportunity to garden and hike and try out that winter-weary boat.

But it's also a potential death sentence for the homebound elderly, a car wreck waiting to happen, a poison picnic. And the heat wave enveloping the Beehive State this week was wreaking havoc on area emergency rooms and doctor's offices.

Anne Brillinger at University of Utah Hospital said emergency room staff were swamped Thursday afternoon. Dr. Brian Shiozawa, chairman of the emergency department at St. Mark's Hospital, said the same was true in his shop, too. "We've seen an extraordinary number of ambulances today," he said.

A call to several local pediatricians' offices found they're awfully busy, as well.

Shiozawa paused for a minute in the bustle to list the illnesses and injuries that come out with the blazing sun: heat stroke injuries, dehydration, an unusually high number of vehicle accidents and increasing domestic assaults. Part of the latter may stem in part from the fact that hot people are thirsty and alcohol consumption goes up with all the rest of the rising beverage consumption.

As summer unfolds, he said, there will be drownings and near-drownings, though not as many as in years with high waters, which move more fiercely. On the other hand, doctors can probably, because of low water levels, expect more injuries where people dive into lakes and ponds and hit obstacles that are far closer to the surface than they think.

Waterborne illnesses will go up along with temperatures, too. Water in lakes and streams are ideal breeding grounds for dysentery and parasitic infections. And some hikers who rely on filter packs to clean out such water for consumption may be surprised, because with water levels low and bacteria counts so high, it won't filter the water clean enough, Shiozawa said.

On hot days, food poisoning isn't just a picnic staple, either. Even in restaurants, he said, food sits out more in warmer rooms and the potential for foodborne illness increases. Kids will go to classrooms and clubhouses and leave their lunches out on shelves, where they'll get too warm and promote the growth of undesirable bacteria and consequent illness.

It happens the first real heat wave of every year," Shiozawa said. Later, if there's another heat wave, we won't see the same spike.

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Right now, allergies and asthma are raging, exacerbated along the Wasatch Front by the fact that so many different plants ripened so early and so fast.

And sports injuries are beginning to appear. Shiozawa has seen a number of broken arms and legs from trampoline accidents in the last few days. Sunburns are also going to be a short-term problem, in severe cases treated like a thermal burn because they blister.

Some of those burns will have to be treated in the long term, as well, when they develop into skin cancer.


E-mail: lois@desnews.com

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