Family of 46-year-old brain-dead patient donates liver

Family of brain-dead woman donates liver, creating green corridor to transfer organ to Lilavati Hospital. ZTCC emphasizes need for more cadaver donations, especially from public hospitals.

Mumbai: The family of a 46-year-old brain-dead woman donated her liver to the Medicover Hospital in Kharghar on Tuesday. A green corridor — a special route when an organ is transplanted traffic-free — was made to transfer the donated organ from Kharghar to Lilavati Hospital in Bandra.

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The Zonal Transplant Coordination Committee (ZTCC) said this is the sixth cadaver organ donation in the month in the city taking the total count of this year’s cadaver donation to 20.

However, the ZTCC insists on further increasing reporting on brain-dead patients, especially from public hospitals, as the contribution from the latter remains poor.

Dr Bharat Shah, general secretary, ZTCC said, “We are happy that the number of cadaver donations has improved but our emphasis now is on improving it further, especially in public hospitals.”

While civic-run KEM Hospital in Parel has started a liver transplant and heart transplant programme, state-run St George Hospital in CST will be starting the liver transplant programme soon. Dr Shah said this will also help in spreading awareness on cadaver donation.

After witnessing a dip in cadaver organ donations during the Covid-19, donations started picking up in 2022 and saw 47 cadaver organ donations. In 2021, the city saw 31 cadaver organ donations. In 2019 it was 76 organ donors in 2020, the city saw 30 donations.

Our sub-committees of intensivists, neurologists and neurosurgeons meet monthly to help guide each other in improving organ donation in the city. This has helped improve the cadaver donation in the city,” said Dr Shah.

The ZTCC also emphasises the counsellors to also counsel patient’s relatives to donate bone, tendons, and skin.

After a gap of three years, the city saw four bone donations last year. A donated bone is used for patients with bone deficiency or in bone reconstruction procedures. Bone and tissue donations help individuals with orthopaedic and neurological conditions that cause bone death and degradation.