A cancer patient got a new lease of life after the doctors at Odisha’s SCB Medical College & Hospital, Cuttack, performed the first-ever allogeneic bone marrow transplant free of cost on Saturday.
The BMT unit in the Hospital has been extending costly treatment facility to cancer patients free of cost – a first such effort in a State government hospital in the country. Till Saturday, the unit at the SCB Medical College had been conducting only autologous BMT.
In autologus BMT, stem cells of the patient are used for one’s cancer treatment while in allogeneic procedure, a donor donates stem cells.
Abhiram Jena, a 21-year-old fatherless youth from Dhenkanal, had no resources to go for the costly treatment. He was suffering from relapsed B — Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia — one type of blood cancer. His sister donated stem cells.
“The BMT, which would have cost around ₹30 lakh and the waiting period would have been at least one year outside Odisha, was carried out with active support of Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik and his administration,” said R.K. Jena, who led the doctors’ team during the critical operation.
‘Landmark treatment’
“This landmark BMT will create opportunity for cure of many blood and other diseases like thalassemia, sickle cell disease, aplastic anaemia, various blood cancers and other cancer diseases. Thousands of patients need this procedure and are not able to receive it due to many logistic challenges outside the State,” said Dr. Jena
Availability of such facilities in government institutions would benefit these patients and the overall cost is bound to come down in private institutions, he said.
“The stem cells were collected from the patient’s sister and were transfused to the patient on the same day. This prophylaxis will be continuing for few weeks,” said the doctors.
According to the BMT Unit, the allogeneic BMT was made possible due to the support of P.K. Mohapatra, Additional Chief Secretary (Health); Datteswar Hotta, administrator of the SCB Medical College & Hospital and C.B.K. Mohanty, Director of Medical Education and Training.
The BMT unit was opened in 2014 with two rooms having all state-of-the-art facilities including stem cell enumeration, stem cell aphaeresis and stem cell storage. This was the first State government hospital with such facilities in the entire country.
