CHENNAI: AN eight-month-old child, whose serious liver ailment pushed her anguished parents to despair, finally saw a ray of hope after a private hospital in the city offered to undertake liver transplant free of cost.
The girl child, J Gyana Sai, from Mulakalacheruvu Mandal in Chittoor district of Andhra Pradesh, was brought here Monday to undergo the surgery at Global Health City on the city outskirts.
Her desperate father, J Ramanappa, had filed a petition seeking mercy killing before the Tamballapalli court. Learning about this, Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu said the cost of treatment would be borne by the government from the Chief Minister’s Relief Fund. Following this, Global Health City chairman and managing director Dr K Ravindranath assured cost free transplant.
At the hospital, the child was assessed to be fit to undergo transplant surgery. Both the parents have come forward to donate liver for this. “We will take it from the suitable parent. The transplant will be performed after two weeks,” said Naresh Shanmugam, paediatric liver specialist at the hospital.
Gyana Sai is suffering from congenital biliary attricia, a rare liver disease that requires liver transplant. One in 10,000 children will have this problem. After the transplant, the child will have 95 per cent chance of survival, said the doctor.