4 people get new lease of life after organ donation

A 26-year-old man, who died in an accident, has given a fresh lease of life to four other persons, by donating his heart, liver and kidneys, doctors of a city hospital today said.

"An MBA student, Ashutosh Sharma was doing his internship with a Delhi-based company. On April 7, while commuting to his office, he met with an accident and was admitted to the Indraprastha Apollo Hospital in a critical condition," a spokesperson of the hospital said.

Doctors said they did their best to revive him, but his condition kept deteriorating and on April 12 he stopped showing any brain stem reflex activity.

"Ashutosh was declared brain dead on April 15," the hospital said, adding that the heart transplant done on the same day.

"His family consented to donate his heart, liver and kidneys to other patients. While his heart was donated to a 33-year-old male patient diagnosed with very poor heart function, his liver was later transplanted in a 49-year-old person," aid Dr Bhabha Nanda Das, Cardio Thoracic and Vascular Surgeon at the hospital.

The spokesperson said a team headed by Das performed the complicated heart transplant procedure. The surgery to four hours.

One kidney was sent to another hospital through the National Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation (NOTTO), he said.

"One of the kidneys was given to a 49-year-old person at Apollo hospital who was suffering from chronic kidney disease and was on dialysis," Das said.

The three recipients at the Apollo hospital have started to show signs of improvement and are being regularly monitored by a team of specialist doctors.