Jamnagar heart beats in city

Neeraj Falia’s life was snuffed out young, but his heart lives on. On Friday, his heart was successfully transplanted into the body of a 54-year-old man from Ahmedabad. It was the first intra-state heart transplant in Gujarat after the State Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation (SOTTO) was given de facto approval by Deputy Chief Minister Nitin Patel in November 2018.

The seventh successful heart transplant in the state was performed by Dr Dhiren Shah, Chief Heart Transplant Surgeon at Care Institute of Medical Sciences (CIMS), Ahmedabad. On December 31, Falia (27), a resident of Jamnagar, met with a road accident in Surat and suffered severe brain injuries. He was declared braindead.

Two of his relatives, who are surgeons, decided to initiate the process for organ donation. Once the parents were convinced, the youth’s heart was donated at MP Shah Medical College, GG Hospital in Jamnagar. This is also the first cadaver donation in Jamnagar district. While the victim’s liver and kidney were brought to Ahmedabad’s Civil Hospital, his eyes were sent to the eye-bank in GG Hospital for donation.

The recipient of Falia’s heart, Dinesh Macwan, a resident of Maninagar, is reported to be recovering well. Urmila Macwan, his wife, said, “With his heart functioning at just 15%, the condition of my husband was very critical. He was suffering from Congestive Cardiac Failure (CCF) and we were informed that his heart would not function for more than 12 months.

After repeated requests by the doctor, we finally agreed to the transplant six months ago and waited for a donor. However, it was on Thursday that Dr Shah informed us about the heart and we agreed for the transplant.” Macwan works at an insurance company in Ahmedabad and was diagnosed with CCF in 2017. With the proposal to set up SOTTO in Gujarat, it is believed that the process of organ donation and transplant will get easier in the state.