New Delhi: The Centre recently issued a directive to States to improve the monitoring of brain stem death (BSD) cases amongst patients admitted to intensive care units (ICUs). This is to counter the low levels of organ donation in the country.
Dr Anil Kumar, Director of the National Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation (NOTTO), addressed states through a letter. He wrote, “The organ donation rate in India continues to be low (less than one donor per million population in a year). One of the key challenges identified in this is poor identification and certification of brain stem death (BSD) cases despite availability of many such potential cases.”
The Transplantation of Human Organs Tissues Act of 1994 mandates the identification of potential cases of brain stem deaths (BSD) in ICUs. If individuals have not opted for organ donation, their families must be informed before their heart stops.
The letter places this responsibility on the attending doctor, along with transplant coordinators, to inquire about organ donation once BSD cases are certified. It also provides a template for a display board to be placed in hospitals, with a list of information that will be regularly collected and analyzed by institution heads and State Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisations (SOTTOs).
SOTTOs have been instructed to gather and send the information from hospitals to NOTTO on the seventh of every month.
