Mumbai blasts: Teen's lungs may collapse

Fourteen-year-old Rahul Verma is lying in the critical care unit at Sir JJ Hospital with his chest wall punctured. His injury has caused blood and air to enter the space between his lungs and chest wall, because of which his respiration is repressed.

His parents are heartbroken, seeing their teenaged boy lying with tubes and wires inserted in him, instead of being in school.

Verma had just finished a long day at Marwari Memorial school at Chira Bazaar. On his way back home, he stopped to grab a bite at Khau Galli in Zaveri Bazaar, when suddenly the world went black, and when he regained consciousness, he could only see black smoke, he told his father.

Rahul was injured so badly that blood and air has filled the space between his lung and the chest wall, putting pressure on the lungs.  Doctors say that this can cause the lung to collapse and making them unable to fill with air (unilateral hemopneumothorax). In the most serious cases, both lungs may collapse (bilateral hemopneumothorax).

“We started panicking when our boy did not return from school and we heard about the blast. We called up all the hospitals and found out that he was injured and had been taken to GT Hospital at Dhobi Talao,” said his father.