Until recently, patients suffering from end-stage kidney disease had no other option but to die in the absence of a kidney donor having the same blood group.
However, the treatment has taken a turn now and a new technique-- ABO Incompatible Transplant -- is fast emerging as a hope for such otherwise dying patients, who can receive kidney from their relatives, irrespective of whether their blood groups match or not.
Although available only in a handful of hospitals across the country, the technique is fast gaining popularity especially among those who are ready to shell out anything between 7-8 lakh for a kidney transplant.
"Introduced just around a years ago in India, and despite its high procedural cost, around 100 kidney transplants using this technique have been conducted in various hospitals of the country. The figure is outcome of presentations recently made in a seminar by various institutions performing this technique," Dr A K Bhalla, Co-chairman of Department of Nephrology, Sir Ganga Ram Hospital in New Delhi, said.
"The reliance of patients on the technique can be gauged from the fact that we have conducted eight such procedures in the past around six months and still we have a long waiting list of patients," added Dr Bhalla.
Dr Bhalla said the use of technique is legally permissible under the Human Organ Transplant Act (HOTA), which allows organ donation only among "near relatives".
Advent of ABO incompatible kidney transplant has expanded the donors’ base as earlier doctors had no other option but to retrieve the kidney from the donor having blood group similar to that of the recipient. Rationale was to prevent acute reaction following mixing of different blood groups in the donor's body after transplant.
However, with the use of new technique, the blood antibodies of the recipient, which otherwise causes such reaction after mixing of blood, are either filtered out of blood or replaced with the neutral fluid, the procedure that prevents the adverse reaction.
"Earlier we have very limited options as good number of near relatives were of dissimilar blood groups. Now after the advent of this technique, kidney can be retrieved from any medically fit near relative of the patient. This has considerably expanded the donor base," Dr Sanjeev Jasuja, Senior Consultant, Department of Nephrology, Indraprastha Apollo Hospital, said.
He said the potential to use the technique was quite high in the country like India, where only around 6,000 patients get transplanted kidneys against the annual approximate requirement of one lakh kidneys.
Dr Jasuja said although the transplant procedure was nearly same, the cost of ABO Incompatible Transplant was high due to expensive gadgets and equipments used in the technique.
He said although the transplant procedure was nearly same, the cost of ABO Incompatible Transplant was high due to expensive gadgets and equipments used in the technique.