Woman, man undergo kidney transplant

A 29-year-old woman and a 40-year-old man got a fresh lease of life after they underwent renal transplant at Safdarjung Hospital.
The kidneys were retrieved from a 40-year-old man, who was declared brain dead, after he met with a road traffic accident in Chandigarh.
The family of the patient wanted to donate his organs, following which PGI Chandigarh authorities intimated NOTTO which as per protocol allocated one of the kidneys to PGI Chandigarh itself while the other one was allocated to Safdarjung hospital.
On February 5, a team of doctors rushed to Chandigarh. According to (Prof) Dr Anup Kumar, head of the renal transplant department at Safdarjung Hospital, there were few challenges. The retrieval time was limited as the donor was not stable and was sinking which means his blood pressure was dropping.

"Our team left at 3 PM by taxi as air tickets could not be booked. They carried along a special box to bring the kidney. At around 7.30 PM, we received another call from PGI Chandigarh saying they do not have a suitable recipient for the one kidney allocated to them.
"Then it was allocated to AIIMS, but they did not have the sample of the donor to get cross match done. Our team carried five samples. By the time our team reached there at 9 PM, they had two options, either to throw the kidney or give it to us. They gave us both the kidneys," Kumar said.

Special boxes were used to preserve the kidneys for 12 hours as there was no green corridor.

"The kidneys had to pass Punjab and Haryana to reach Delhi. The cross match revealed that they matched with two recipients. The team returned at around 5 AM. We had the operation theatres ready and the transplant surgeries took place," Dr Kumar explained.
While one was transplanted on Preeti Kumari, who was surviving on dialysis due to kidney disorder, the other one went to Tara Chand, who can now work again.
Safdarjung Hospital has conducted five cadaveric renal transplants so far and there is a waiting list of another 50 patients.