First in-house liver transplant performed at GRH

In a first at a government hospital outside Chennai, the doctors at Government Rajaji Hospital (GRH) in Madurai performed an in-house cadaver liver transplant on Thursday.

A 31-year-old Armed Reserve police personnel who was admitted with a head injury sustained during an accidental fall was on Wednesday declared brain dead and a potential organ donor.

Following approval from his relatives, his two kidneys, heart, liver, skin, bones and corneas were harvested. The kidneys, liver, skin, bones and the corneas were kept at the GRH for in-house transplants.

A team of doctors transplanted the harvested liver to a 42-year-old male recipient. The team of doctors also performed an in-house cadaver kidney transplant to a 22-year-old recipient.

As the liver transplant had remained a long-awaited procedure at the GRH due to the technical complications involved in the process, the successful first attempt would encourage more transplants in the future, a senior doctor said, adding that efforts to carry out other transplant surgeries would be taken.

The team of doctors that performed the surgeries comprised S. Padmanabhan, S. Karthikeyan, A. Sastha, R. Villalan and S. Balamurali of Surgical Gastroenterology Department; Kannan and Ramani of Medical Gastroenterology Department; Kalyanasundaram, Vairavarajan, Shanmugasundaram, Senthilkumar, Balamurugan, Ramesh, Pramod and Murali of Anaesthesia Department.