Pledging body organs is considered sacrosanct. And why not? When you or your dear ones live even after death, the feeling is profound and for the receiver, the joy knows no limit. But does pledging remain as just an emotional and spirited gesture? While eye donation campaigns and awareness drives are common in Bangalore, City Express found that these campaigns need a different approach to identify potential donors, rather than filling up the shelves with pledging forms.
According to Vikram Chaudhuri, CEO, Sankara Eye Hospital, a major issue with the campaigns, especially in a city like Bangalore is that they are conducted in IT companies, malls, colleges, etc. “So the pledgers are young,” he says.
Which quite means that the wait is definitely long, considering the average age of an Indian today to be about 50-60 years. “We get pledgers in the age group of 18-40 years,” says Veeresh MPM, manager at Dr Rajkumar Eye Camp. But then going by him, the numbers are increasing every year. “We got 870 eyes last year, while in 2012 we got about 750 and 650 in 2011,” he says.
Young pledgers
As a matter of fact, while the pledgers are huge and young, the actual conversion into donation is comparatively miniscule. “We get about 2-3 pledgers in a day and if we do a campaign, which we conduct regularly, the numbers cross 100 to 200 a day,” Veeresh says.
But then, it is a sensitive matter and while there is a lot of enthusiasm while pledging, when death comes knocking, nothing is remembered. “Most often than not, a pledger’s relative does not know about his or her pledge. And by the time something unfortunate happens, nobody is aware. And time span is also too vast,” says DA Kalpaja, Director, Vydehi Institute of Medical Sciences and Research Centre.
Changing focus
The campaigns, according to Vikram, is now shifting to hospitals and old age homes from malls and IT companies. “We are trying to create awareness among hospital staff who attend to critically ill patients. They can better relate to the patient as well as their relatives. After all, death is not an easy moment to talk about donation,” he says.
Ashok S, Manager at Shankar Anand Singh Eye Bank says that there is a counsellor specially for the purpose to counsel relatives of the diseased at Narayana Health City, where they provide the service.
Dr Narpat Solanki, Chairman, Dr Solanki’s Eye Hospital states that there needs to be volunteer groups among youngsters who should encourage donation of any organ, if there is a death in their locality. “Even ambulance drivers, should be encouraged to counsel family members. Enforcing donation cannot happen in our country because of its multi-religious nature and so no political party will bat for it.”
Saving nine lives
According to Dr Amit Agarwal, Chairman, Medihope Hospital, the health ministry should take strong notice. “Nine organs in our body can be donated which means nine lives can be saved. The organ donor registry is just for namesake. Counselling and coordinators should be made mandatory. The Vajpayee Arogyashree’s arogyamitras can be roped in for the same.”
ICUs, oncology departments, casualty departments are where counsellors need to be posted, says Kalpaja. “We have counsellors in our Oncology department as a routine, who encourage the patients to go for organ donation,” she says.