Team Herald
PANJIM: Regional and State Organ Tissue Transplant Organisation (Western region), affiliated to the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, has drawn the attention of the State authorities concerned on the need to set up the State Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation or SOTTO in Goa.
A brain dead man’s organs harvested recently at a private hospital in Goa were taken to Mumbai instead of being donated to a patient waiting for transplant at Goa Medical College (GMC), prompting the health department to order an inquiry into it.
In this regard, ROTTO, Western Region, Mumbai, Director Dr Astrid Lobo Gajiwala, had recently written a letter to Goa’s Health Services Director Dr Sanjiv Dalvi on the need to set up the SOTTO.
In her letter to Dr Dalvi on April 10, Dr Gajiwala explained that cross matching of donor and recipient is also essential for kidney transplantation and that there are no cross matching laboratories in Goa.
The letter further states, “Since the THOTA Rules also require ROTTO to coordinate the establishing of new transplant and retrieval centres, ROTTO, Western Region, also helped facilitate the emergency registration of a Non Transplant Organ Retrieval Centre.”
She clarified that ROTTO would very much have liked to oblige the request of GMC Dean Dr Pradeep Naik for allocation of a kidney to a patient in his hospital. “However, this could not be done because we could not bypass the system.”
“First, Goa had no approved waiting list of kidney recipients, so there was no one to whom the kidney could be allocated at midnight. Second, no emergency cross matching facilities were available in Goa,” explained Dr Gajiwala.
She said, “To prevent the wastage of organs and facilitate timely transplant, it was therefore decided that for this one time, until Goa puts its systems in place, the organs could be utilised in the nearest State in the Region, best connected by air, namely, Mumbai.”
“In view of the belated demand for organs made by Goa Medical College, it may also be noted that last-minute changes in allocation cannot be permitted in this system as it involves the life of recipients and logistics of great magnitude,” said Dr Gajiwala.
Dr Gajiwala also assured that the ROTTO would, in future, would be very happy to see organs that are donated in Goa being used by recipients in Goa itself, and the inclusion of Goa in ROTTO/NOTTO allocation of organs from other States when they become available.
Meanwhile, the Goa chapter of the Indian Medical Association (IMA) had earlier expressed serious concern over the delay in setting up SOTTO in the state.
