Delhi: First heart transplant at Safdarjung Hospital

NEW DELHI: When Vijay Menon was declared brain dead at Narayana Super Speciality Hospital, his family agreed to the hospital's suggestion that the 62-year-old Gurgaon guest house manager's organs should be donated. Their decision could potentially help four persons live better lives.
The decision also led the Centre-run Safdarjung Hospital to conduct the first heart transplant procedure.
"My father was a selfless man. He would have cherished our decision," Menon's daughter Sandhya said.
Menon's heart was transplanted into a 44-year-old man from Samastipur in Bihar, who was admitted to Safdarjung Hospital.
"The recipient was evaluated in the department of cardio thoracic vascular surgery (CTVS) and cardiology and diagnosed with advanced heart failure due to severe coronary artery disease in March this year," Dr Anubhav Gupta, the head of the CTVS department at Safdarjung Hospital, said. He added that the patient was on the National Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation's (NOTTO) recipient list and was allocated Menon's heart on May 3, two days after Menon was declared brain dead.
A team of doctors, with the assistance of an expert from AIIMS CTVS, performed the transplant on Thursday. "This is the first heart transplant by Safdarjung Hospital,"' said medical superintendent Dr B L Sherral.
Dr Swadesh Kumar, the medical superintendent at Narayana Superspeciality Hospital, said Menon, who was a manager at a guest house in Gurgaon, was brought to the hospital unconscious and with a complaint of severe headache on May 1. He was immediately shifted to the ICU following a CT scan. However, his brain ceased to function hours later due to a spontaneous intracranial haemorrhage.
Recognising him as a potential donor, the hospital informed Menon's family and counselled them about the organ donation. The family gave their approval.
NOTTO officials said one of Menon's kidneys was allocated to Sri Balaji Action Medical Institute and was transplanted into a 20-year-old girl who had been on dialysis for five years. "The patient is stable and is expected to be discharged within a week," said Dr Rajesh Aggarwal, chief of kidney transplant at Sri Balaji Action Medical Institute.
The other kidney was given to a 36-year-old woman at Akash Hospital.
Dr Kumar said the donor's liver was successfully transplanted into a 22-year-old girl suffering from Wilson's Disease, a congenital chronic liver disease. The woman from Bhubaneswar had been suffering since childhood and had never attended school. After the transplantation, she may live a normal life, doctors said.