2 brain-dead people give new lease of life to three patients

Pune/Mumbai, August 18

Two brain-dead persons gave a new lease of life to three patients, with a lung of one of the donors being flown from Pune to a hospital in Chennai and her heart transported to Mumbai.

The hospital in Chennai claimed it to be the longest-distance haul of donated lung in the country.

A 22-year-old woman was declared brain dead at the Ruby Hall Clinic in Pune after she sustained a head injury due to a fall on August 16.

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Her husband agreed to donate her organs, following which one of her lungs was harvested and flown from Ruby Hall Clinic in Pune to Gleneagles Global Hospital in Chennai on Thursday and transplanted successfully into a patient.

The Chennai-based hospital, in a release, claimed it was “the longest-distance haul of donated lung in the country”.

“Upon receiving an alert about suitable lung available at Pune’s Ruby Hall Clinic, our team rushed to the city and after initial assessment, found the lung to be suitable for the patient, who is suffering from end-stage lung disease and awaiting her chance for a donor for transplantation,” Dr Sandeep Attawar of the Chennai-based hospital said.

He said one of the lungs of the donor was harvested at around 1.30 am on Thursday and rushed to the Pune airport by road. The flight carrying the organ and the transplant team landed at the Chennai airport at around 4.30 am.

The lung was then transported to the hospital in Perumbakkam suburb of Chennai in 15 minutes and successfully transplanted into the patient, said Dr Attawar.

Meanwhile, the woman’s heart was on Thursday transported by road to Fortis Hospital at Mulund in Mumbai, through a green corridor by covering 143 km in 1.49 hours.

The heart was then transplanted into a 24-year-old college student from suburban Ghatkopar, who was suffering from a heart ailment and had been on the wait list since May, a release issued by the Fortis Hospital said.

Besides, the family of a 45-year-old woman, who died in MGM Hospital at Vashi in Navi Mumbai, also agreed to donate her organs.

Subsequently, her heart was on Thursday transported by road from Vashi to the Fortis Hospital, covering 18 km in 16 minutes. The heart was then transplanted into a 58-year-old patient from Thane, the hospital said.

The second heart transplant in the hospital was carried out nearly four hours after the heart transported from Pune was transplanted into another patient, it said.

Dr Anvay Mulay, the head of cardiac transplant team in Fortis Hospital, said, “Our teams, medical social workers and nursing units worked with the donor hospitals to retrieve the hearts and also worked in tandem with the civic authorities to transport it to the OT (operation theatre) in record time.”

“We wouldn’t have been able to conduct these surgeries without the consent given by the kin’s families, who stood strong in time of grief,” he said.

Mulay also expressed hope that with the numbers of the cadaveric donations climbing, they would be able to help more such end-stage organ failure patients. PTI