Mumbai: After 56 years, KEM hospital performs successful heart op

After a gap of 56 years the BMCrun King Edward Memorial KEM Hospital successfully performed its first heart transplant on ThursdayThe donor is Sai Parab 34 who passed away because of severe complications during pregnancy that led to bleeding inside the brain Her husband Deepak Parab said ldquoWe rushed her from Kalyan to KEM hospital and she remained in the hospital for four days We were then told she would have to be either on the ventilator or we can choose to donate her organs while there is still time It was a difficult and emotional decision but both of our families were on board We found satisfaction in the idea that she would live on in some wayrdquoSai Parab the deceased donor left with her husband DeepakThe transplant procedure saved the life of a 38yearold man suffering from ischemic dilated cardiomyopathy a condition where the heart is weakened due to reduced blood flow KEM Hospital continues to be the only civic hospital in the country to have successfully performed a heart transplant The equipment for the recent procedure worth R2 crore was funded by former Congress MP Kumar KetkarldquoThe planning for the transplant was being made for the past few months The successful transplant was the outcome of a team effortrdquo said Dr Sangeeta Ravat dean of the KEM hospital Dr Uday Jadhav head of the Department of Cardiovascular and Thoracic Surgery at KEM Hospital said the transplant procedure went on for about seven hours ldquoWe had trained ourselves in the 3day Zonal Transplant Coordination Centre ZTCC programme conducted at KEM hospital two months agordquo he saidPrivate doctors roped inDue to a lack of expertise in transplants the hospital had to rope in some of the private doctors to be part of the historic moment The surgery was headed by Dr Pravin Kulkarni who is a consultant at Thanersquos Jupiter Hospital he said ldquoThings are always possible if there is enough support from government and bureaucracy KEM hospital has asked me to assist the heart transplant team for the first year till they are independentrdquoWhile the transplant laws in India are the same for both public and private setups it is seldom the case that the procedure is conducted at government or civic hospitalsA heart transplant was last performed at the KEM hospital on February 17 1968 by Dr P K Sen and while it was successful the patient had passed away three hours after the procedure After 1968 the second heart transplant in Mumbai was performed in 2015 in a private hospitalLack of training in public hospitalsDr Hemant Pathare a heart and lung transplant surgeon at Jaslok Hospital and part of ZTCC said ldquoIt is very rare that organ donation takes place in a public hospital Even from the hospital side there is no dedicated effort to convince the relatives of the brain dead patients On the contrary in private set ups there is an entire team who counsel families and make them realise that in a way part of their kin will stay alive in this worldrdquoThe data until 2020 shows the highest number of organ donors to be in 2019 all 79 were from private hospitalsldquoAnother reason why transplants occur in private hospitals frequently is training Hospitals as well as government administration need to prioritise training doctors in transplant procedures KEMrsquos achievement will perhaps pave the way for it nowrdquo Dr Pathare saidMeanwhile the recipient of the heart transplant is being kept under observation for 15 daysSevenDuration of surgery in hours