PANJIM: Dr Devananda, Cardiothoracic and Vascular Surgery, HOD and Consultant at Manipal Heart Institute on Friday said that Manipal Hospitals is lending support and encouraging organ donation drive and motivating people to pledge their organs and give a second chance of living to the people in need.
Devananda has been visiting Goa for 10 years and offering cardiac services. He also has the credit of performing five successful heart transplants.
Addressing the media, Devananda said, “Heart failure is a serious condition, but still not very well managed in our country. Although the western countries are quite advanced in managing this subset of patients, the awareness about this in India is far from satisfactory. When device therapy is very expensive for our patients with end stage heart failure, heart transplantation is in its infancy.”
He said, “We need more awareness to improve organ donation in our society. More and more people must come forward for this noble cause as organ donation is still a taboo in our country.”
According to the latest statistics approximately 5 lakh people across the nation die each year due to the wide gap between the number of transplants awaited and the organs available. Around 1 lakh people die of liver disease every year, about 2,20,000 people await kidney transplants, almost 10 lakh people await corneal transplants, 50,000 people await heart transplant and about 20,000 people are in need of lung transplant.
