The Kalinga Institute of Medical Sciences (KIMS) has started audit of brain-dead patients who can be a potential organ donor on a monthly basis. On July 13, a KIIT constituent had helped in harvesting two kidneys from a brain-dead paediatric patient which were later successfully transplanted in two patients at a private hospital and both the recipients are doing well.
On July 31, there was also a corneal harvest done at the KIMS.
The KIMS’ success of harvesting two kidneys from the paediatric patient, for which the parents played a major role in giving consent, was perhaps the biggest one for the KIMS team. But the team members still feel the society is yet to mature to pledge organ donation. The awareness has not yet come to a level for harvesting more organs and help needy patients enduring endless wait.
Speaking on the World Organ Donation Day (August 13), Associate Professor of Nephrology Dr Nikunj Kishore Rout said, “By organ donation in one go, a person could save at least eight lives, i.e., with two kidneys, two parts of liver, one heart, two lungs and one pancreas. If we consider tissues like cornea, skin and other parts, the list would be more. But we need to have family members like the parents of this paediatric patient, who came forward to donate despite the grief.”
He called for a change of mindset of the people close to the brain-dead patients to come forward for organ donation. If more and more in Odisha could get consent from next to kin and the administrative authorities to harvest organs from the road accident victims, who become brain-dead in many cases, then there could be a major turnaround in the transplant programmes. As per record, Odisha saw 5,081 deaths last year due to road accidents, he said.
However, the nephrologist said there are logistic and legal hurdles in medico legal cases (MLCs) arising from the accident victims. The administrative and legal issues can be solved when the Government and private organisation along with some NGOs working in these fields sense the urgency and join hands to save many lives.
“We need to activate a campaign for people to pledge for organ donations. However, once the pledged person becomes brain-dead, it’s the family, which has to take a call,” Dr Rout explained.
Turning the page of history of organ donation, the first-ever successful living donor transplant took place in the world, way back in 1954 in the USA.