Heart, lungs travel 1,660 km to save lives

When a 40-year-old man suffering from a severe head injury was declared brain dead at the Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education & Research (PGIMER), the National Organ & Tissue Transplant Organization (NOTTO) stepped in to ensure his organs don't go waste. As a result, his heart and lungs travelled over 1,660 km from Chandigarh on a chartered flight to Fortis Hospital in Mulund in less than 2 hours 28 minutes.

"The Mumbai and Delhi NCR region officials had shared the waiting list of those in need of organs. We were able to coordinate between different regions or else we had a situation where donor lungs were available but were not being used due to lack of awareness," said Dr Vimal Bhandari, director, NOTTO.

"A national registry is the need of the hour and we want officials of all regions to share details of the patients on the waiting list so that no one gets an organ out of turn and the distribution is fair," he added.

In this case, the donor's wife agreed to donate his organs. The liver and kidneys were given to patients on the waiting list at PGIMER, corneas were sent to the eye bank and heart and lungs to Mumbai. The heart went to a man from Dombivli, who was suffering from dilated cardiomyopathy.

The lungs meanwhile went to a 55-year-old woman from Indore, who was suffering from end-stage lung failure. She had been on the wait list for over two weeks."The cost rose in this case as the charter flights demanded a lot of money to fly from Chandigarh to Mumbai. We wanted to use an Air Force aircraft but that it was not possible," Dr Bhandari said.

NOTTO oversees organ transplants across the country having coordinated close to 130 donations this year.