BENGALURU: In a rare case of kidney transplant in the city, a 68-year-old patient received an organ that the donor himself got 8.5 years ago. Globally only eight such cases have been reported.
The 62-year-old donor Surya (name changed) had received the kidney from his elder brother. Surya was suffering from severe chronic kidney disease and his brother’s kidney was a perfect genetic match and it was functioning normally.
However, on June 10, 2018, while he was heading home on his scooter, he suffered a bad fall. He nevertheless continued his ride home. But later he experienced a severe headache and was rushed to hospital.
There he had a cardiac arrest and was shifted to B.G.S Gleneagles Global Hospitals. On evaluation, the doctors found that he had suffered an intracerebral hemorrhage and was swiftly taken for emergency surgery. Unfortunately, his condition continued to deteriorate and after two days he was declared brain dead.
The family came forward and suggested organ donation. But as Surya himself was a kidney recipient, the possibility of donating his kidney was unlikely. In most cases, a kidney after 10 years of transplantation is likely to have some dysfunction and retrieving a transplanted kidney through surgery is clinically difficult.
Surprisingly, in this case, the transplanted kidney was found to be functioning normally. Surya’s elder brother was 62 during the time of donation. Hence the age of the kidney was around 71 years.
Any donor after 60 years is considered an ’extended criteria donor’, which means that transplanting such a kidney may have less than optimal function.
However, in this particular case after a complete assessment and evaluation by a team of doctors, the kidney was offered to a 68-year-old individual, who was diagnosed as suffering from end-stage renal disease. As for complexity of the surgery, Dr Narendra S., Chief Transplant Surgeon and Urologist at BGS Gleneagles Global Hospitals, said the major challenge was the complexities involved in the procedure.
