Media Release
Mangaluru, Jan 4: The Deceased donor programme which was initiated by A J Hospital way back in 2015 has gained momentum, and awareness of organ donation has reached the masses. The programme is named ‘Jeevan Vileena’ after the first two donors Jeevan and Leena, who are the torch bearers for the donation. Since then till date in Dakshina Kannada and Udupi districts, there were a total of 41 donations. That means, nearly 150 patients have benefited from this programme and they are grateful to the families who have given them a new life. Karnataka, this year, had a record number of donations and hundreds of families had a new lease of life by getting organs which otherwise would have been destroyed.
One such instance occurred on December 11, 2022. The family of a brain dead donor decided to donate organs to the needy patients. ‘Jeevasarthakathe’, a Karnataka government body, activated the patients for transplantations. Hence a team of surgeons retrieved organs at Father Muller’s hospital and the heart, liver, lungs and kidneys were allotted to various hospitals. The challenge is to transfer the organs to the specified hospitals and do the transplant surgeries in a minimum amount of time.
In this rare instance, both the kidneys were allotted to A J Hospital for two separate patients who were on the priority list. The challenge for the transplant team was to retrieve kidneys from the donor, bench prepare the organs and do transplant on both patients within 6-7 hours. The team took it as a challenge and completed both the surgeries one after another in the specified time. Both recipients did very well post-surgery and were discharged within 12 days.
This was an unique opportunity as it generally does not get allotted to same hospital, but the challenge was taken up by the team comprising Dr Prashanth Marla, Dr Pritham Sharma, Dr Roshan V Shetty (transplant surgeons), Dr Raghavendra Nayak (nephrologist), Dr Harish Karanth (anaesthetist), Sowmya (transplant coordinator), Savina Roshni and Mahabala (OT staff).