I told him not to have Brufen, but he had no patience with pain

A single 400 mg Brufen tablet made 35-year-old Tanmay Bhattacharya, psychology professor at IIT, go into coma in August 2006. He still lies inert.

As narrated by his mother - and hope to learn from it. For the last one-and-a-half years, his mother has been urging him to get up and go to his class for his lecture. When you meet him, you catch her urging him just once more. "Tanmay, get up, go to your class. Your students are waiting," she says, almost desperately. Tanmay remains inert, just a flicker of an eyeball indicating that perhaps somewhere through the fog of darkness in his brain, he can hear his mother's desperate plea.

Tanmay, professor of psychology at IIT, Powai, India went into coma on August 18, 2006, hours after having a single 400 mg Brufen tablet, to tide over the pain of a small finger injury. Today, a year-and-a-half later, he still lies in what's medically called, a semi-conscious state. He lies inert, breathes through a tracheostomy tube, is fed liquids through a tube directly connected to the stomach, cannot talk or move and his family isn't too sure of how much he can hear, see or, least of all, understand. Tanmay suffered from asthma and the painkiller, in the form of Brufen, had a near-fatal reaction on his body. On the way to the hospital Tanmay suffered a massive cardiac arrest, his heart stopped beating. At the hospital, CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation) was done to get his heart beating and he was put on a ventilator. For six days, he fought with death. On the seventh day, his heartbeat stabilised enough for him to be taken off the ventilator. But the doctor's verdict was shattering after the MRI: about 80 per cent of his front and middle brain was damaged due to lack of oxygen. He had a condition called hypoxia, which victims of drowning or strangulation usually suffer from. It's caused by a lack of oxygen supply to the brain, which leaves part of the brain dead. Then came the real blow: it's a condition that no treatment or medication can help, most often patients don't even survive.

Don't take a chill pill!Too many of us are in too much of a hurry today. There's no time to go to the good old physician anymore. Life is like their travel checklist: fresh underwear, toothbrush, pills. Over-the-counter (OTC) pills, one for headache, one for cold, maybe one for stomach ache too. Pill popping has gone up alarmingly, and it's only when one hears of cases like Tanmay's that one stops in one's tracks.

Dr Altaf Patel, physician, Jaslok Hospital, lists four of the most common types of pill popping:

• Non-steroidal anti inflammatory drugs (NSAID). These set off asthma attacks. In Tanmay's case, it led to a massive cardiac arrest and subsequent coma and hypoxia.

• Cold medicines containing phenyl propanol amine. These can raise blood pressure, so blood pressure patients beware of popping pills to control that running nose or a cough.

• Aspirin. Dr Patel says that it's only a misconception that this is safe. Often, it causes internal bleeding and one doesn't even know about it until it develops into something serious.

• Paracetamol. The common use of paracetamol is to beat a hangover after a night of drinking. It causes liver damage.

Only vitamin B-complex and anatacids should be sold over the counter.

Pill popping is injurious to health. Television ads propagating the use of painkillers and medicines for cold should also come with a tag line warning people of the side-effects of their use.What about educating pharmacists at medical shops? Who actually help people to self-medicate and pop pills and have been known to sell drugs for malaria too, over the counter?