Apollo sets up liver transplant centre in Bangalore

Leading super-specialty hospital group Apollo Wednesday unveiled its centre for liver disease and transplantation here to provide advanced liver care.

"Besides treatment in our city hospital, the service will be made available through multi-disciplinary liver clinics across the state to patients suffering from liver and hepatobiliary-pancreatic disorders," Apollo senior consultant for liver transplant Anand Khakhar said in a statement here.

Liver failure is potentially fatal as the vital organ progressively stops functioning resulting in jaundice, accumulation of fluid in body, blood vomiting and confusion.

"Hepatitis-B or Hepatitis-C infection, excess alcohol consumption, diseases such as biliary cirrhosis and sclerosing cholangitis can cause liver failure. A liver transplant is recommended when other treatment options fail to prolong life. In transplantation, a diseased liver is replaced with a healthy liver to enable the affected patient live a normal life," Khakhar said.

The centre offers liver and multi-visceral transplantation to patients of all ages suffering from various liver ailments. It is also equipped with the facility to treat patients with liver, biliary and pancreatic cancers through laparoscopic surgery and radio-frequency interventions.

In view of the rise in cases of liver diseases across the country, the Apollo group has drawn a liver transplant care programme to provide healthcare to the affected people through surgery in Chennai, Hyderabad and Bangalore.