Delhi AIIMS conduct second successful harvested lung transplant

By Shalini Bhardwaj
New Delhi [India], July 30 : India saw its first-ever successful harvested lung transplant in the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in the national capital on Saturday.
The achievement came after a fifty-year-old woman became the second recipient of a transplanted lung within three months at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), by receiving the lungs of one Amresh who had lost his life in an accident.
"In recent past, there have been frequent organ donations from AIIMS Trauma centre; but lungs were never harvested from any donor because they have been considered unfit for the transplantation use," said Dr Milind Hote, Professor in the Department of Cardiothoracic and Vascular Surgery at AIIMS Delhi.
"Although lung transplant occurs frequently in our country, this was the first time when a pair of healthy lungs were harvested for transplant from AIIMS Trauma Centre," Dr Milind Hote added.
AIIMS' Neurosurgeon Dr Deepak Gupta also explained that an Organ procurement team at JPN Apex trauma centre along with ORBO had worked together to make this retrieval possible.
"This is the first time our Cardiothoracic And Vascular Surgery (CTVS) and Thoracic Surgery team from AIIMS have harvested lungs from a patient and successfully transplanted it at AIIMS, Delhi," Dr Gupta added.
The doctor further revealed that the family decided to donate the organs of the donor after they were counselled and explained about the incident of 5-year-old Rolly.
The family was initially hesitant for donating the organs, but when the donor's wife Kusum (who is also an ASHA worker) was shown a story of a 5-year-old girl Rolly Prajapati whose donated organs saved five lives after she was shot dead on April 27, doctors revealed.
"Kusum agreed to donate the organs of her husband to save a few lives and make his husband's heart beat in someone else's chest," Dr Gupta said quoting her statements during the counselling session.
According to Dr Anant Mohan, Professor of Pulmonary Medicine and Sleep Disorders, the recipient is stable and is currently under close monitoring and observation in the post-operative ICU.
"She was waiting for a lung transplant for more than a year. It is a big pre-operative and post-operative teamwork," Dr Anant Mohan said praising the coordinated efforts of all the surgeons, ORBO coordinators, transplant team, forensic department, and the Police administration.
As per the information, the donor Amresh Chand was on a work-related assignment when he was hit by an auto-rickshaw in Delhi on Wednesday (July 27). He was subsequently declared 'brain dead' by the doctors at the AIIMS Jai Prakash Narayan Apex Trauma Center on Thursday (July 28).
"The family's willingness to donate the vital organs of their deceased successor to light the lives of others advocates the fact that goodness prevails in the darkest of times," Head of the Organ transplant and retrieval organization at AIIMS Dr Aarti Vij told ANI.
Liver, lungs, and one kidney of Amresh was translated into the respective recipient at AIIMS Delhi, while his heart and other kidney have been allocated to the R&R hospital and Institute of Liver and Biliary Sciences (ILBS) hospital through the National Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation (NOTTO).
"Liver was given to the same patient from Gwalior who could not receive liver transplant last year as he turned positive for Covid on the day of his proposed transplant," Dr Deepak Gupta said.