With the kite festival Uttarayan inching closer, the city hospitals are gearing up to tackle the flood of injuries that the festival brings along.

A majority of the medical cases during the festival are head injuries sustained after falling off the roof and manja cuts.

Anticipating this, a few hospitals have set up separate 24-hour wards/booths for the purpose, while others are confident of tackling the issue on a routine basis.

On the two days preceding the festival as well as on Uttarayan, on an average, 40 emergency cases are expected in each of the hospitals.

N Chandana, Resident Medical Officer (RMO), V S Hospital, said: “We have already set up a special ward to tackle any emergency cases.”

Also, the Medisurge Hospital has set up about 15 booths and the Shardaben Municipal General Hospital has made special arrangements to deal with emergency cases during the festival.

Civil Hospital Superintendent M M Anchalia said: “We are totally prepared for providing emergency services round the clock with plastic surgeons, neuro-surgeons and other specialty doctors. As we have adequate arrangement for handling mass emergency cases at our trauma centre, we have not set up any special ward.”

Anchalia said they are expecting nearly 10 cases of head injuries and two or three major manja cuts during three days. “Since people keep looking at the sky for any risk while driving, road accidents also increase,” he added.

Kaushal Patel, District Manager (Ahmedabad), Emergency Management and Research Institute, said: “We are adding two extra ambulances to our fleet of 20 for the Ahmedabad city during the festival. We expect a 30-per cent increase in road mishaps as well as the non-vehicular trauma (like falling off the terrace) cases.”