By Express News Service – CUTTACK 20th June 2013 12:26 PM
Non-compliance to medications, improper living condition and bad hygiene in the post-operative stages is taking a heavy toll on kidney transplant patients at the SCB Medical College and Hospital here.
As many as eight of the 30 odd end-stage kidney disease patients, who had undergone transplants at the Renal Transplant Unit, have succumbed, according to information collected through an RTI application filed by an activist Rohan Kumar Mohanty.
The doctors say that none of the deaths can be attributed to failure of surgery.
One patient died of severe head injury and cerebral bleeding and three others were lost to unrelated conditions as heart failure.
The rest four have fallen victims to infections due to different reasons. That is a major risk factor in post-operative stages of kidney transplant.
The four deaths that can be related to transplants were due to septicemia and fungal pneumonia,they maintained.
“We have not had a single death of patient till discharge from the hospital either due to rejection of the transplanted organ or to infections”, head of the Transplant Unit Prof Datteswar Hota said.
Transplant patients are given immuno suppressive therapy to prevent rejection of the newly acquired organ by the body.
Decrease in immunity automatically renders the body vulnerable to infections like septicaemia and pneumonia.
Since, most of the patients who have undergone transplants belong to poorer section, it is very difficult to maintain the prescribed protocol, said Dr Hota. What such patients need is hand holding support from family and the hospital staff.