Telangana topped the country in performing the highest number of organ donations from cadavers or brain dead patients in 2018.
With 160 organ transplants from cadavers under its belt, Telangana managed to pull ahead of Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Maharashtra.
According to a Times of India report, there was a significant rise in the number of cadaver donations in Telangana compared to Tamil Nadu and Kerala which saw its numbers plunging. Tamil Nadu had recorded a total of 160 organ transplants from cadavers in 2017 while it only performed 150 in 2018.
Kerala, on the other hand, saw an extremely sharp decline in organ transplants. 2015 had seen 76 organ transplants from cadavers, 72 in 2016, 18 transplants 2017 and only 7 in 2018.
The report says that the dip could be because of the change of rules for declaring a cadaver fit to donate organs.
"Of the four doctors who declare brain death, one must be from a government hospital and another from a facility other than the recipient's and donor's hospital. Besides, the brain-death declaration must be videographed. After these changes were made in February 2017, private hospitals almost stopped facilitating organ donation as it's difficult to mobilize doctors given the time constraints," said Dr Nobel Gracious, a nodal officer in Mrithasanjeevani, a Kerala network for organ sharing, was quoted as saying by TOI.
Jeevasarthakathe, the nodal agency for organ donation in Karnataka, said that most organ transplants occur in private rather than government hospitals. The organisation said that at least 90 per cent of brain death declarations are made by private hospitals while the contribution from government hospitals was only 10 per cent.
