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Pune hospital conducts city’s first organ donation during lockdown
On Friday, May 15, Pune’s Ruby Hall Clinic, in liason with Sahyadri hospital, became the first hospitals in the city and the second in Maharashtra, to carry out an organ donation during the last two months of the lockdown due to the Covid-19 pandemic
On Friday, May 15, Pune’s Ruby Hall Clinic, in liason with Sahyadri hospital, became the first hospitals in the city and the second in Maharashtra, to carry out an organ donation during the last two months of the lockdown due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
With the lockdown, many hospitals had postponed or even cancelled surgeries. While recipients were unwilling to travel fearing transmission of the fatal infection, non-Covid patients were not admitted to hospitals and the number of donors had also gone down drastically.
Aarti Gokhale, transplant coordinator of the Zonal Transplant Coordination Committee (ZTCC), Pune, confirmed that the organ donation was completed on May 15 at the hospital and that it was the first one in two months in the city.
Dr Astrid Lobo Gajiwala, director of the regional organ and tissue transplant organisation (ROTTO), western region, said, “This would technically be the second organ donation after the lockdown was announced. On March 24 there was one transplant at Mumbai hospital. There were no organs transplanted in April and this is the first in May for the entire state.”
Gokhale confirmed that this is the first for Pune since the official lockdown came into place on March 24.
The hospital’s director (medical services), Dr Sanjay Pathare, said the liver was retrieved from a 49-year-old brain dead donor hailing from a village in Ahmednagar district.
The patient had suffered severe head injury in a road accident on May 11 “Despite critical care management the brain damage could not be reversed and he was declared brain dead on May 14. The son expressed his willingness to donate the organ and we explained to him the complete organ donation process and assured wholehearted cooperation. The organ donation was completed on May 15 and the body handed over to the relative,” Dr. Pathare said.
The organ wad retrieved at Ruby Hall and transferred to Sahyadri hospital’s Ahmednagar road branch, where a recipient was ready to receive the organ.
Dr Sunil Rao, group medical director, Ruby Hall, said, ‘The recipient is a 62-year-old female suffering from liver disease.”
Gokhale said since the lockdown, not a single organ transplant had been conducted in Maharashtra. Hospitals had cancelled surgeries. “While organ donation is an essential service it is not an emergency service. In normal conditions, on an average, about five-six organ donations take place a month in Maharashtra,” Gokhale said.
The National Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation (NOTTO) has guidelines to ensure that the transmission of the infection does not take place during the transplant process like checking the travel history, location of the recipient and also donor..
