State makes retrieval of organs easier

Mumbai:In a major attempt to spur organ donations, the Maharashtra government has allowed "non-transplant hospitals equipped with an ICU and operation theatre" to retrieve organs and made it mandatory for them to officially identify brain dead patients. 

    The state on Thursday passed four resolutions based on the Human Organ Transplantation Act, 1994. The first mandates certification of "brain dead condition" by a "Brain Stem Death Committee". It's duty will be to confirm if a patient is brain dead and, if so, to inform the Zonal Transplantation Coordination Committee. 
    "The ZTCC, after obtaining relatives' consent to retrieve the brain dead person's organs, will arrange for them to be sent for transplantation as per the waiting list," said an official. Organ donations may get a boost 
Mumbai: The state has issued four government resolutions to spur organ donations, one of which details who will be in a Brain Stem Death Committee. The notification says the panel should comprise the doctor in charge of the hospital, a physician or surgeon, an interventionist, a neurologist or neurosurgeon, and the registered medical practitioner treating the patient. 
    "If a hospital doesn't have a neurosurgeon, it can avail the service of one from a different panel," a senior official told TOI. 
    Another resolution permits non-transplant hospitals with an ICU and an operation theatre to remove organs once a patient is certified as brain dead. At present, Maharashtra has 94 registered transplant centres, of which 27 are in Mumbai. The relaxation of rules is expected to go a long way in boosting cadaver (postdeath) organ donations. Officials said the public healthdepartment was earlier considering insisting on a minimum number of beds as the condition for enlisting hospitals—like Tamil Nadu-—but forewent it for ICU and OT facilities. 
    The last order makes it compulsory for hospitals registered under the Human Organ Transplantation Act to maintain records of transplant surgeries, the counselling department and the transplant coordinator. "It will also have to ensure positive publicity for successful cases," said another official. 
    Dr Sujata Patwardhan, the secretary of the Zonal Transplant Coordination Committee, welcomed the resolutions, saying they are likely to add to the pool of organ donors. "Currently, 29 hospitals in the city are registered with the ZTCC and thereby authorised to carry out transplants. But only eight of them are actively doing it." Dr Patwardhan cautioned that the logistics in transporting organs from retrieval to transplant centres are still to be worked out.