The first green corridor created by the Madurai city and district police from Uthangudi to the airport on Wednesday afternoon ensured that the liver and heart from a donor at Meenakshi Mission Hospital and Research Centre (MMHRC) reached recipients in Chennai in time.
The deceased, M. Damotharan (29) hailing from Nilakottai, sustained grievous head injuries when he was travelling on a two-wheeler on Kodaikanal Road on May 31. He was declared ‘brain dead’ by neurosurgeons at the MMHRC on Tuesday afternoon following which his relatives were counselled for organ donation. They agreed to donate his organs to hospitals in Madurai and Chennai.
The MMHRC management said that it intimated the Tamil Nadu Cadaver Transplant Programme Committee in Chennai about the donation and it reverted within two hours, giving the green signal to harvest the organs.
As the harvesting was done from 11.30 a.m. on Wednesday, the police made preparations for the green corridor and stationed personnel at every junction on the Ring Road to keep it traffic-free.
“Our focus was on the smooth transit to the airport as well as safety since the 19-km-stretch is usually a busy one and is full of potholes. As soon as the boxes were loaded into the ambulance at the hospital, we alerted the police to cordon off traffic,” explained T.K. Murugesan, Assistant Commissioner (Traffic).
The first ambulance carrying the heart left the hospital at 12.55 p.m. and the second one with the liver left at 1.25 p.m. and both reached the airport in less than 20 minutes, against the usual time of about 40 minutes. The ambulances were escorted by a police vehicle all through the route.
The heart was taken to Frontier Lifeline Hospitals and the liver to MIOT Hospital, Chennai, where surgeries were already under way on recipients, and transplanted.
“Since the heart needs to be transplanted within one and a half hours after it is harvested, it was taken earlier. The liver can be kept for a longer period and transplantation can be performed till eight hours,” said K. Sampath Kumar, Head, Nephrology Department, who oversaw the harvesting.
The kidneys of the deceased were donated to two patients undergoing treatment at the MMHRC and the eyes were given to Aravind Eye Hospital in the city.
