Brain-dead farmer's organs give new lease of life to five

PUNE: Relatives of a 45-year-old brain-dead farmer donated his vital organs, including heart, liver, lungs and kidneys, benefitting five patients in the city and Chennai on Friday morning.
The harvested lungs were flown to Fortis Malar Hospital in Chennai, where they were successfully transplanted into a patient suffering from an end stage lung disease.

This is the second time that lungs were successfully retrieved from a brain-dead patient at Ruby Hall Clinic in the city. The first lung retrieval was carried out in August last year.

The donor - hailing from a village at Baramati taluka in Pune district - had suffered grievous head injuries in a road accident on February 6. After initial treatment at a hospital in Baramati, he was shifted to Ruby Hall Clinic here the same day. But he could not be revived. The doctors declared him brain-dead on Thursday morning.

"We counselled the family members for organ donation. The brain-dead man's elder brother came forward and consented to donate organs," said the hospital's transplant coordinator, Surekha Joshi.

The doctors informed officials of the Zonal Transplant Coordination Committee (ZTCC) about the donation of vital organs, including lungs. The ZTCC officials, in turn, informed officials at the National Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation (NOTTO) - the apex body that oversees organ donation and allocation in the country.

According to the norms, NOTTO allocated the lungs to a patient enrolled for lung transplant at the Fortis Hospital in Chennai. Some doctors from the Fortis Hospital came to the city and lungs retrieval began at 9.30pm on Thursday. They harvested both the lungs by 4.30am and rushed to the airport by road. The flight carrying the organ in a medical preservation solution box and the transplant team took off around 5.20am.

The man's heart was successfully transplanted into a 59-year-old woman suffering from cardiomyopathy, an end stage heart condition, at Ruby Hall Clinic.

His liver benefitted a 56-year-old man suffering from liver cirrhosis at Ruby Hall Clinic. His kidney benefitted two patients of renal failure at Ruby Hall Clinic and Aditya Birla Memorial Hospital in Pimpri Chinchwad.