A rare double transplant surgery at a private city hospital gave a new lease of life to a 12-year-old boy from Sudan.

Mukhtar Ahmed Ali Gadkarim was suffering from a rare disorder known as Primary Hyperoxaluria, in which levels of oxalate increases in the blood because of an enzyme deficiency in the liver. High levels of oxalate then damages kidney, eyes, bones and other organs. Gadkarim got a new liver and kidney, donated by his sisters, who are accompanying him for the surgery.

While Arwa, 29, donated her kidney, Asma, 27, donated a part of her liver to save their youngest of four brothers. "Since he is our youngest brother, we could not see him suffer. We wanted him to live, so we got in touch with the doctors here through the internet," said Arwa.

Gadkarim was admitted to Apollo Hospital on November 6 and was operated by a combined team of liver transplant specialist Subhash Gupta and kidney transplant specialist Sandeep Guleria. Gadkarim underwent a 16-hour combined liver and kidney transplant surgery.

The Sudanese boy was discharged on Thursday, 17 days after the combined transplant surgery.

"This is one of the most challenging transplants in medical science as it requires extensive dialysis pre-operatively and then post-operatively. Moreover, three people are being operated simultaneously, so there is no scope for error," said Dr Anupam Sibal, senior pediatric gastroenterologist at Apollo Hospital. "Only one in five lakh people is affected by primary hyperoxaluria," he said.