With these temperatures, heat exhaustion can happen quicker than you might expect and it can even affect the most healthy individuals, like an 18 year old Fort Worth woman, who learned the heat is downright dangerous.
Emauhni Turner says she thought she was doing everything right to beat the heat during her 45 minute walks to and from work.
“Normally I take a bottle of water with me everyday. I make sure I refill it,” said Turner.
However, last Saturday's walk home in the sun proved to be too much for this otherwise healthy 18-year-old.
“My head started to hurt really bad. It was a throbbing type of pain. My chest started to get tight. I started to feel nauseous. My knees were weak. My hands were shaky,” said Turner. “When I walked in my room, I just collapsed.”
Her family called 911 as Turner quickly became one of dozens in the last week to unexpectedly succumb to heat exhaustion.
Experts say it can affect anyone and without medical attention, like IV fluids, it can turn into heat stroke.
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“Heat stroke is a much more serious condition. This is when the body has lost its ability to regulate its temperature. Generally people may not be sweating. Their body temperature could go up high. Just this month, we saw body temperatures of 106 and 107. That is truly life threatening,” says Matt Zavadsky, with Medstar Mobile Healthcare.
After an ambulance ride and a two hour hospital visit, Turner was fully re-hydrated and out of danger.
She now dresses in light clothes and drinks extra water before her walks to work.
“No matter how long you’ve been in Texas, because Texas is a hot place, it could still happen to you,” she said.
