FIRST SUCCESSFUL KIDNEY TRANSPLATATIONS FROM BRAIN DEAD

The first transplantations of kidneys extracted from a brain dead patient have been conducted successfully in the country’s medical history at Human Organ Transplant Center, Bhaktapur last Thursday.

Executive Director Pukar Chandra Shrestha said,” This is an important achievement in the country’s medical sector.” According to him, in foreign countries, of the total cases of kidney transplantations conducted in a certain period of time, the 80 per cent is taken from the clinically dead people. Nepal is listed in the country where road fatalities are higher and we can turn this record into a cause for the humanity. Life of many people in need of an organ transplant can be saved removing certain organs from the clinically dead people and transplanting them into the needy.”

The kidneys of Gobinda Bhujel, 30, from Sindhuli who was declared clinically dead following a jeep accident last Thursday were removed and successfully transplanted in two kidney failed patients same day. Govinda Timilsina, 51, of Sunsari and Milan Shrestha of Lazimpat, Kathmandu who were among the patients waiting to undergo kidney transplant in the center are the first beneficiaries of this important achievement.

The government last year revised the Human Organ Transplantation (Regulation and Prohibition) Act of 1998 which allows extractions of 8 organs from a brain dead and their transplantation into others. The Act now allows the extraction of eight organs (kidneys, lungs, pancreas, small intestine and cornea) and their transplantations.