HYDERABAD: It is a story of sacrifice, the kind you read in books of the yore. A Jagannatham, a middle-class resident of Malakpet in his mid-50s was admitted to Global Hospitals with his liver all but damaged in April 2003. The docs said that they could try and save him by experimenting with a liver transplant. But somebody had to donate the liver. His wife, A Prameela volunteered. The operation was conducted with the larger right half of the liver taken away from Prameela and transplanted in the body of Jagannatham.
But a tragedy was in the making. Two days later donor Prameela suffered a heart attack and went into coma. And 15 days later, the husband died of sepsis (infection). Prameela never came out of coma to see him die. She died on Tuesday after lying comatose for 44 months. That's not the end of the story. The family sometime after the death of their father filed a police complaint charging the hospital with negligence and filed a compensation claim with the consumer court. A ruling is still awaited. Meanwhile, the hospital slapped a Rs 44 lakh claim on the family as charges for the failed operation and other services. The family has coughed up Rs 10 lakhs already to the hospital.
Because of the police case, when Prameela died on Tuesday her body was not handed over to her two sons, but was taken for post-mortem. Kin of the deceased assert that although Jagannatham was too weak for the surgery, that they were cajoled and reassured by the doctors that donor and recipient would recover completely. Uday Bhaskar, donor's younger son, said: "We were not clearly informed of the risks of the surgery.
The doctors were confident and wanted to go into surgery immediately. Of the five such surgeries in consecutive years in Global, only two have been successful." His elder brother A Srinivas says: "They said my mother would be normal in five weeks and that my father would recover in six weeks. The doctors have to date not told us exactly why my mother suffered a heart attack".
Doctors at Global Hospitals said they spared no effort to give Prameela the best care. Dr K Ravindranath, MD of the hospital, said: "We are not gods. We did everything we could. The surgery was successful, his liver was functioning well enough. Sepsis affects 20 per cent of transplant patients. The drugs we gave also numb the immune system further". He added: "If not for our efforts, Prameela would not have lived so long."
Source - Times of India.
But a tragedy was in the making. Two days later donor Prameela suffered a heart attack and went into coma. And 15 days later, the husband died of sepsis (infection). Prameela never came out of coma to see him die. She died on Tuesday after lying comatose for 44 months. That's not the end of the story. The family sometime after the death of their father filed a police complaint charging the hospital with negligence and filed a compensation claim with the consumer court. A ruling is still awaited. Meanwhile, the hospital slapped a Rs 44 lakh claim on the family as charges for the failed operation and other services. The family has coughed up Rs 10 lakhs already to the hospital.
Because of the police case, when Prameela died on Tuesday her body was not handed over to her two sons, but was taken for post-mortem. Kin of the deceased assert that although Jagannatham was too weak for the surgery, that they were cajoled and reassured by the doctors that donor and recipient would recover completely. Uday Bhaskar, donor's younger son, said: "We were not clearly informed of the risks of the surgery.
The doctors were confident and wanted to go into surgery immediately. Of the five such surgeries in consecutive years in Global, only two have been successful." His elder brother A Srinivas says: "They said my mother would be normal in five weeks and that my father would recover in six weeks. The doctors have to date not told us exactly why my mother suffered a heart attack".
Doctors at Global Hospitals said they spared no effort to give Prameela the best care. Dr K Ravindranath, MD of the hospital, said: "We are not gods. We did everything we could. The surgery was successful, his liver was functioning well enough. Sepsis affects 20 per cent of transplant patients. The drugs we gave also numb the immune system further". He added: "If not for our efforts, Prameela would not have lived so long."
Source - Times of India.
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