On July 1, 27-year-old K. Ilavarasi, who donated one of her kidneys to her husband R. Kalairasan, became the 1,000 live donor of the renal transplant programme at Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital.
Four months ago, Kalaivarasan, who works as a gardener in Singapore, was diagnosed with high blood pressure and a kidney ailment.
“He was put on dialysis there, but the doctors told him to go to Chennai,” said Ilavarasi.
The couple, from Tiruvarur district, initially came to the hospital for dialysis, but when Ilavarasi was found to be a match, she decided to donate one of her kidneys.
Both husband and wife are doing well post surgery, said doctors at GH.
“Tamil Nadu is the first State in the country to offer free transplant services,” said dean R. Vimala, at a programme held on Tuesday to mark the hospital’s milestone.
N. Gopalakrishnan, head of the hospital’s nephrology department, said they had performed a total of 1,143 renal transplants since 1986, with 1,003 being live related donor transplants and 140 cadaver donor renal transplants.
“As it is World Organ Donation Day on August 6, we would like to create more awareness of organ donation,” he said.
The hospital topped the country with the most number of cadaver donor transplants performed free of cost, said Dr. Gopalakrishnan.
“We have even had 57 beneficiaries from other States, including Bihar and West Bengal, and three patients from Sri Lanka and Nepal,” said Dr. Gopalakrishnan.
The pre-transplant evaluation and post transplant follow-ups are also free, as are the expensive immunosuppressive medicines that patients have to take all their lives, he said.
The patients’ survival rate for the first year was 92 per cent, and for the third, 85 per cent, he said.
“It is difficult to follow up beyond that, as many beneficiaries are not from the city. But our longest surviving recipient is a man from Villupuram, who received a kidney in 1993,” he said.
