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Rare form of skin cancer cured at Cytecare Hospital Bangalore

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Amina, who was suffering from skin cancer, was misdiagnosed in Nigeria

Thirty seven-year old Amina Abubakar was not sure that she will survive after being diagnosed with breast cancer. Amina, who hails from Nigeria is a final year medical student, who was wrongly diagnosed with breast cancer in 2014 in Nigeria while she was actually suffering from skin cancer. After struggling for more than three years, Amina can now breathe easy. Thanks to the treatment that cured her at a city hospital.

She was bed-ridden for more than three years under heavy antibiotics and other cancer treatments. But the last 20 days made her recover miraculously. That is after the doctors removed a 5 kg tumour from her breast. Talking about her condition, Amina said, “I found a lump on the left breast in November 2014 and then was diagnosed as chronic mastitis in local hospital in Nigeria. I have suffered wongdiagnosis and lack of treatment for years. I was physically and mentally broken and was unable to deal with the pain and the foul smell that comes with cancer.”

Unable to find any cure in Nigeria, Amina, whose father was also once treated in a city hospital, decided to travel to Bengaluru.

She adds, “My family and I got very anxious about this situation and on the recommendation of a local doctor decided to visit Dr Anthony Pais at Cytecare for treatment.

” But it wasn’t easy for the city doctors to cure her as the disease was rare. “Skin cancer on the breast and infiltrating it is the rarest of the rare cancers in the world. This was the first treatment for a rare form of skin cancer – Syringocystadeno carcinoma paplliferum, which was diagnosed and treated in the world. It is one such case where the right diagnosis was the game-changer in the treatment of the disease,”claimed Dr Anthony Pais.

He said, “There are two types of skin cancer – melanoma and non-melanoma, most of them being non-melanoma. Among all the non-melanoma skin cancers, 75% of them are basal cell cancers; 20% of them are squamous cell cancers and about 2% of them being adnexal skin tumours. Most of these adnexal tumours are benign. The rarity of this adnexal skin cancer involving the breast is the rarest of the rare cancer. In this case, the problem started with the wart and with a birthmark close by, which is technically called a nevus. This grew over a period of time.”

Amina, who got a new lease of life, will head for Nigeria this Saturday. She will continue a follow-up at a local hospital for a couple of months more.

Curious case of cancer

According to Dr Pais, it is very difficult to know about the disease or diagnose it at an early stage. So, there is no precaution and can’t be prevented. Moreover, it is not genetic. Excessive exposure to sunlight can be one of the reasons. People living near the Equator are more prone this type of cancer as they are exposed to direct ultraviolet rays. One might diagnose this case to be that of a breast cancer which can be followed by unnecessary chemotherapy. The treatment is for the skin cancer arising on the breast infiltrating into it. So, proper surgery and radiotherapy is the answer. People should consider screening if they have any ulcer for more than three months. They should do that in case of moles or itching that appears for a months.

Source: http://bangaloremirror.indiatimes.com/bangalore/others/nigerian-woman-cured-of-rare-cancer-in-city-hospital/articleshow/59276487.cms

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Suffering from diabetes? Eating broccoli can help keep it in check

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When the researchers gave concentrated broccoli sprout extracts to 97 human type 2 diabetes patients in a 12-week randomised placebo-controlled trial, obese participants who entered the study with dysregulated disease demonstrated significantly decreased fasting blood glucose levels compared to controls.

Eating broccoli sprouts may help diabetes patients manage their blood sugar, according to a new study which offers a much needed alternative to address the worldwide epidemic.Eating broccoli sprouts may help diabetes patients manage their blood sugar, according to a new study which offers a much needed alternative to address the worldwide epidemic.

Type 2 diabetes affects more than 300 million people globally, and as many as 15 per cent of those patients cannot take the first-line therapy metformin because of kidney damage risks. Seeking a more viable path forward, researchers identified compounds that might counter the disease — associated gene expression changes associated with type 2 diabetes. The researchers, including Annika Axelsson of Lund University in Sweden, constructed a signature for type 2 diabetes based on 50 genes, then used data sets to screen 3,852 compounds for drugs that potentially reverse disease.

The most promising chemical — sulforaphane, a naturally occurring compound found in cruciferous vegetables — tamped down glucose production by liver cells growing in culture, and shifted liver gene expression away from a diseased state in diabetic rats.

When the researchers gave concentrated broccoli sprout extracts to 97 human type 2 diabetes patients in a 12-week randomised placebo-controlled trial, obese participants who entered the study with dysregulated disease demonstrated significantly decreased fasting blood glucose levels compared to controls. The researchers said that developing gene signatures to investigate large public repositories of gene expression data could be a valuable strategy to rapidly identify clinically relevant compounds.

Source: http://indianexpress.com/article/lifestyle/health/suffering-from-diabetes-eating-broccoli-can-help-keep-it-in-check/

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Prolonged Sitting May Lead to Premature Death

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Sedentary lifestyle is one of the biggest perpetrators of lifestyle ailments in today’s world. With more and more hours spent glued to our workstations, most of us are leading an alarmingly inactive life. The ill effects of prolonged sitting have long been highlighted by experts from all over. While some link it with obesity, others have tied it with risks of developing hypertension, heart ailments and even premature death.

The World Health Organisation recommends at least 150 minutes of moderate-to-rigorous level of physical activity for an average adult. Many experts also consider walking at least 10000 steps a day as the benchmark of keeping fit in general. Unfortunately, most of us fail to reach up to that level of fitness and become a feeding ground of a host of ailments.A recently published study has gone a step further and linked prolonged sitting with the risk of premature death. After examining and studying close to 40 different studies, experts concluded that sitting for long significantly increases a person’s risk of developing type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, cancer, and premature death. Although regular exercising is more than recommended too ensure a healthy lifestyle, experts also suggest that regular physical activity cannot do much to offset and undo the damage done by the day-long sitting.

“The ill-effects of high levels of sitting may prove to be especially damaging given that so many people sit for long periods,” added professor Stuart Biddle from Victoria University in Australia.

The idea is not to make up for the prolonged state of activity by adding a burst of exercise somewhere in the day, the ideal approach is to cut down this state of physical activity by taking regular breaks, doing basic body stretches at your workstation, taking stairs whenever possible and going for a small walk. One should always get up from the seat every 15 minutes to avoid muscles from getting damaged.

Source: http://food.ndtv.com/health/experts-link-prolonged-sitting-with-risk-of-premature-death-1717166

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Combating chronic kidney disease with exercise

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Study finds that specially designed program improves blood vessel health

A research team is combating chronic kidney disease (CKD) with exercise. The team had patients engage in a specially designed exercise program and found that it improved their blood vessel health and exercise capacity.

A University of Delaware research team in the College of Health Sciences is combating chronic kidney disease (CKD) with exercise.

Dave Edwards, professor in UD’s Department of Kinesiology and Applied Physiology, received a National Institutes of Health grant to investigate whether exercise training could improve the health of the blood vessels.

Edwards and postdoctoral researcher Danielle Kirkman invited early stage CKD patients to take part in a specially designed exercise program, all completed under the expert supervision of UD researchers.

The study showed the exercise program improved blood vessel health and exercise capacity. Equally as important, patients reported improvements in their everyday quality of life as a result of becoming more active.

More than 26 million American adults have CKD and, because of difficult-to-see warning signs, late detection is common. The leading cause of death in patients with CKD is cardiovascular disease.

The end of the study turned out to be just the beginning for participants. They wanted to continue exercising, but lacked a safe, supervised environment.

To meet the demand, Edwards’ lab started a renal rehab exercise program for CKD patients in the community. The program is open to non-dialysis CKD, dialysis patients and those that have received a kidney transplant.

“There are two groups of patients that fall through the cracks — those who have exercised with us and want to continue and those who didn’t qualify for our studies, but wanted to start exercising,” Edwards said.

The team works individually with each patient to reach their goals, whether it’s controlling blood pressure or losing weight for a transplant.

“If you look at other areas like cardiac or pulmonary rehab, exercise training is well-integrated as part of routine care; that’s not the case with kidney disease,” Kirkman said. “Exercise may have an array of health benefits to these patients ranging from keeping their diabetes under control, maintaining healthy muscles and blood vessels to controlling weight gains after a transplant that are associated with prescribed medications.”

Once word got out that UD was offering the program, the research team fielded a mini-explosion of interest. Transplant doctors and dialysis clinics began sending patients to the renal rehab program to work on their health and fitness. Soon groups of kidney disease patients were exercising together — sometimes eight people per session in the friendly confines of the Kinesiology and Applied Physiology (KAAP) Exercise Intervention Lab.

Source: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/06/170628144841.htm

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This new insulin pill could make diabetes treatment ‘painless’

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Insulin has been successfully encapsulated using Cholestosomes that can be administered orally with tiny vesicles that can deliver insulin where it needs to go without injecting.
US scientists have developed an oral method of administering insulin that can be a less painful alternative to millions of people worldwide with diabetes who have to inject themselves with the drug to manage their blood-sugar levels.
The team has successfully encapsulated insulin using Cholestosomes – a neutral, lipid-based particle – that can be administered orally with tiny vesicles that can deliver insulin where it needs to go without injecting.
The biggest obstacle to delivering insulin orally is ushering it through the stomach intact. Proteins such as insulin are no match for the harsh, highly acidic environment of the stomach. They degrade before they get a chance to move into the intestines and then the bloodstream where they’re needed, the study said.
However, the new vesicles that are made of naturally occurring lipid molecules are normal building blocks of fats, the researchers said, adding that they are unlike other lipid-based drug carriers, called liposomes.
“Most liposomes need to be packaged in a polymer coating for protection. Here, we are just using simple lipid esters to make vesicles with the drug molecules inside,” said lead researcher Mary McCourt, Professor at Niagara University in New York, US.
Computer modelling showed that once the lipids are assembled into spheres, they form neutral particles resistant to attack from stomach acids. Drugs can be loaded inside, and the tiny packages can pass through the stomach without degrading.
When cholestosomes reach the intestines, the body recognises them as something to be absorbed. The vesicles pass through the intestines, into the bloodstream, and then cells take them in and break them apart, releasing insulin.
Studies with rats showed that certain formulations of cholestosomes loaded with insulin have high bioavailability, which means the vesicles travel into the bloodstream where the insulin needs to be, the researchers concluded.
The results were presented at the 252nd National Meeting and Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS), in Philadelphia, recently.

Source: http://indianexpress.com/article/lifestyle/health/this-new-insulin-pill-could-make-diabetes-treatment-painless-2994333/

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‘Ovarian tissue freezing’ may provide hope for fertility treatment

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Ovarian tissue freezing can be an alternative method to promote fertility, especially in women who cannot undergo egg freezing due to cancer or other medical reasons, researchers say. The procedure which is still considered experimental involves removal and freezing of ovarian tissue for later use.


The procedure which is still considered experimental involves removal and freezing of ovarian tissue for later use. The study, published in the journal Reproductive Sciences, showed that ovarian tissue freezing helped nearly four out of 10 (37.7 per cent) women to have children later in life. Between 1999 and 2016, a total of 309 ovarian tissue freezing procedures resulted in 84 births and eight pregnancies that lasted beyond the first trimester, data showed.

“Despite the clinical progress within the past two decades, the procedure still remains in the experimental realm,” said Fernanda Pacheco from the Innovation Fertility Preservation and IVF in New York, US.

“Now, women considering this procedure to preserve fertility and postpone childbearing have more information at their disposal. Given these recent data, ovarian tissue cryopreservation should be considered as a viable option for fertility preservation,” Pacheco added.
The procedure also restored reproductive functions. It reversed menopause in nearly two out of three women (63.9 per cent). This included either a resumed menstrual cycle, ovarian follicular growth, or natural fertility. Ideally, egg freezing is done by cancer patients before beginning their treatments such as chemotherapy, radiation therapy, which can have lasting impact on their fertility.

Kutluk Oktay, from New York Medical College, who performed the world’s first ovarian tissue cryopreservation in 1999 considers the procedure is superior to egg freezing as it can also reverse reproductive functions.
“The next frontier is to explore the procedure’s potential in delaying childbearing among healthy women, not just cancer patients,” Oktay added.

Source: http://indianexpress.com/article/lifestyle/health/ovarian-tissue-freezing-may-provide-hope-for-fertility-treatment-4752964/

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‘23% of heart failure patients die within a year of diagnosis’

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In India, 23 per cent of heart failure patients die within one year of diagnosis, a study revealed on Tuesday, adding that the country is next to Africa where the rate stands at 34 per cent.
Of the total deaths, 46 per cent were due to cardiac issues, while non-cardiac causes led to 16 per cent deaths in patients, at one year, according to the first comprehensive study on heart failures conducted across six geographies globally.

The International Congestive Heart Failure (INTER-CHF) study said that death rate of patients due to heart failures in Southeast Asia is 15 per cent, seven per cent in China, nine per cent both in South America and West Asia, significantly lower than in Indian patients.

“In India, heart-related diseases occur a decade early than the people of west. Lack of awareness, out of pocket expenditure and lack of infrastructure are corroborating to the heart-related diseases,” said Sundeep Mishra, Professor of Cardiology at All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS).
Stating that with increasing life expectancy of the population, incidence of heart failure is increasing in an epidemic proportion, the cardiology expert said that the marked variation in mortality in low-income countries like India can be attributed also to the quality and access to primary healthcare facilities.
The study was aimed at measuring mortality at one year in patients, due to heart failure in India, Africa, China, the Middle East, South East Asia and South America.
During the study, 5,823 patients across 108 centres in six geographies were enrolled. Patients were followed up at six months and one year from enrolment. The mean age of patients was 59 years, with a male to female ratio of 60:40.The primary outcome of the study was to record all cause mortality within one year.

A previous study by AIIMS, published in the journal of Practice of Cardiovascular Sciences, highlighted that late diagnosis results in one third of patients dying during hospital admission and one-fourth dying within three months of diagnosis.
Calling for a community based approach to resolve the issue, Mishra said a lot of Indians also do not understand the difference between heart failure and heart attack because of which they do not consult doctors.

“Heart failure refers to the condition where the blood pumping capacity of the heart is reduced. Whereas heart attack is secondary to blocked coronary circulation, where the blood supply to muscles of heart is cut or drastically reduced. Heart failure is a serious health hazard and can be life threatening if ignored,” Mishra told IANS, while speaking about the rising heart failure cases.
According to the World Health Organisation, heart failure impacts more than 60 million people worldwide.

The risk of death of heart failure patients is comparable to that of patients with advanced cancer. It currently costs the world economy $108 billion every year.
Although, heart failure may strike at any age, it is more common in people over the age of 65. It includes high blood pressure, prior heart attack, enlarged heart and diabetes.
Mishra said the major reason for low awareness of heart failure among people is the fact that patients mistake it for signs of getting older.
“Although there is no cure for heart failure, patients who are diagnosed early need to follow their treatment and make lifestyle changes to live longer, feel better and be more active. It is, therefore, vital that patients and care givers are aware of the symptoms of heart failure, leading to better recognition and earlier diagnosis,” said Mishra.

Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/life-style/health-fitness/health-news/23-of-heart-failure-patients-die-within-a-year-of-diagnosis/articleshow/59769273.cms

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New discovery could lead to ‘fundamental’ change in leukemia treatment

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Researchers have identified a new cell mechanism that could lead to a fundamental change in the diagnosis and treatment of leukaemia.

A team in the University of Kent’s pharmacy school conducted a study that discovered that leukaemia cells release a protein, known as galctin-9, that prevents a patient’s own immune system from killing cancerous blood cells.

Acute Myeloid Leukaemia (AML) – a type of blood cancer that affects over 250,000 people every year worldwide – progresses rapidly because its cells are capable of avoiding the patient’s immune surveillance. It does this by inactivating the body’s immune cells, cytotoxic T lymphocytes and natural killer (NK) cells.

Existing treatment strategies consist of aggressive chemotherapy and stem cell transplantation, which often do not result in effective remission of the disease. This is because of a lack of understanding of the molecular mechanisms that allow malignant cells to escape attack by the body’s immune cells.

Now the researchers at the Medway School of Pharmacy, led by Dr Vadim Sumbayev, Dr Bernhard Gibbs and Professor Yuri Ushkaryov, have found that leukaemia cells – but not healthy blood cells – express a receptor called latrophilin 1 (LPHN1). Stimulation of this receptor causes these cancer cells to release galectin-9, which then prevents the patient’s immune system from fighting the cancer cells.

The discovery of this cell mechanism paves the way for new ‘biomarkers’ for AML diagnosis, as well as potential targets for AML immune therapy, say the researchers.

‘Targeting this pathway will crucially enhance patients own immune defences, helping them to eliminate leukaemia cells’, said Dr Sumbayev. He added that the discovery has the potential to also be beneficial in the treatment of other cancers.

Article: The Tim-3-galectin-9 Secretory Pathway is Involved in the Immune Escape of Human Acute Myeloid Leukemia Cells, Vadim V. Sumbayev et al., EBioMedicine, doi: 10.1016/j.ebiom.2017.07.018, published online 19 July 2017.

Source: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/releases/318700.php

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Could Type 2 Diabetes Be Transmissible ?

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A new study has found a prion-like mechanism that drives type 2 diabetes.

Although the findings are preliminary, new research suggests that type 2 diabetes may be transmissible in a way that is similar to prion disorders such as “mad cow disease.”
Type 2 diabetes affects more than 420 million people worldwide, its causes remain largely unknown. However, a new study has uncovered a novel mechanism that may drive the disease. The discovery could change the way we approach type 2 diabetes, both from a research perspective and from a therapeutic point of view.

More specifically, the study investigates the possibility that type 2 diabetes might be caused by a misfolding of islet amyloid polypeptide protein (IAPP).
The research was led by Claudio Soto at the McGovern Medical School in Houston, TX, which is part of the University of Texas Health Science Center in Houston.
The findings, published in The Journal of Experimental Medicine, show that type 2 diabetes shares similarities with a group of transmissible neurodegenerative diseases known as “prion diseases.”
Examples of such diseases include bovine spongiform encephalopathy – popularly known as “mad cow disease” – or its human equivalent, Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease.

IAPP in type 2 diabetes
Previous research has shown that up to 80 percent of all type 2 diabetes patients have an accumulation of IAPP in the pancreas’ islets. These are small clusters of cells inside the pancreas, which contain, among other cells, insulin-producing beta cells.

IAPP is a peptide hormone that is secreted together with insulin by the pancreatic beta cells. While the effect of this excessive IAPP in type 2 diabetes is not fully known, it is believed that it damages the beta cells, stopping them from producing the insulin that the body needs to lower blood sugar levels.


Examining the ‘prion-like’ mechanism
Prion diseases get their name from the excessive accumulation of an abnormal form of a so-called prion protein – that is, a cellular protein that occurs naturally in the body. This abnormal form of the prion protein is generated through a mechanism called misfolding. Normally, proteins gain their functional shape through a process referred to as folding.
But when they do not fold correctly, or “misfold,” these proteins clump together, forming aggregates such as the ones found in Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, Huntington’s disease, and other neurodegenerative conditions.

Moreover, in some of these diseases, a few of the misfolded proteins can act as “seeds” that trigger other proteins to misfold. In these diseases, the seeds – or abnormal prions – can transmit from one person, or animal, to another.


Prion-like mechanism may cause diabetes
For their research, Soto and his team designed a mouse model wherein the mice’s pancreases were genetically modified to express human IAPP.
They injected misfolded IAPP into these mice and found that it triggered the formation of protein deposits, or aggregates, in the mice’s pancreases.
Additionally, the mice developed type 2 diabetes symptoms within weeks of having IAPP injected: they lost beta cells and had high blood sugar levels.
Furthermore, the researchers examined the effect of misfolded IAPP in pancreatic islet cultures, taken from healthy humans. There, too, misfolded IAPP triggered the formation of large IAPP aggregates.
Therefore, it appears that misfolded IAPP can, in fact, cause aggregates in a way that is similar to infectious prion disorders.

Although there have been numerous cases of patients who developed type 2 diabetes after organ transplantation, the authors caution against jumping to conclusions.

“Considering the experimental nature of the models and conditions utilized in this study, the results should not be extrapolated to conclude that type 2 diabetes is a transmissible disease in humans without additional studies,” Soto warns.

He further comments on the significance of the findings, saying, “Until now, this concept has not been considered. Our data, therefore, [open] up an entirely new area of research with profound implications for public health.”

“Perhaps more important than a putative inter-individual transmission, the prion-like mechanism may play a key role in the spreading of the pathology from cell to cell or islet to islet during the progression of type 2 diabetes.” – Claudio Soto

Source: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/318725.php

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Organ donation up 4-fold in India, but still a long way to go

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Of the 85,000 liver failure patients who join the country’s wait list annually, less than 3% get an organ. Also, of the two lakh fresh annual registrations for kidneys, 8,000 manage a transplant. Thousands waiting for heart or lungs face bigger odds as barely 1% get an organ before time runs out.

Despite cadaveric organ donations witnessing a near fourfold increase in the last five years, the demand-supply disparity in the country remains grave.Over 2.5 lakh deaths in India are attributed to organ failure annually, while cadaver donations are still very few in comparison. India’s organ donation rate in 2016 stood at an abysmal 0.8 persons per million population compared to Spain’s 36 per million, Croatia’s 32 per million or US’s 26 per million.

Experts say the gap exists because only ten states and two UTs have an active donation and transplant programme.States such as UP , Chhattisgarh, Himachal Pradesh, Goa and the North-East are yet to make a debut. Stakeholders blame lack of awareness, infra and political will as well as myths and misconceptions for the sluggish pace of cadaver donation.

” Even after decades, the programme is a non-starter because of systemic complexities.The problem lies within hospitals and is not so much about people’s acceptance any more. Police formalities remain difficult and time-consuming, discouraging people from donating,” says Dr Sunil Shroff of Chennaibased Mohan Foundation. “

There have been cases where people have approached us wanting to donate organs but either the hospital or the city lacked the infrastructure to retrieve organs,” he says, underlining how in a country with an acute shortage, organs get wasted.

Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Kerala, Karnataka, Telengana and Gujarat currently lead the way. Delhi and Chandigarh too managed 30 donations in 2016.

Dr Vimal Bhandari, director of the National Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation, says the government is aware of the crisis. “We have signed an MoU with Spain which has the world’s highest donation rate. About 100 countries are learning their model. Their experts will train five of our regional coordination centres,” he says, adding that Spain took 30 years to build its programme.Unlike Spain, where majority of brain deaths occur due to haemorrhage, in India, road accidents are the main killer.

India’s infrastructure too is growing. The national network facilitated 136 instances of organ sharing between cities and e states. “Last year, we even saved the lives of two foreigners who underwent heart transplants here,” Dr Bhandari says.e Tamil Nadu runs India’s g most successful programme by e taking a slew of decisions to ea se donations about a decade , back; families donating organs a don’t have to move for NOCs or post-mortems. Also, the state offers free kidney , liver and heart transplants in government hospitals like developed nations.

Maharashtra, that crossed 100 cadaver donations last year despite one of Mumbai ‘s top hospitals being involved in a kid ney racket, has carried out 1,064 transplants in the last five years. Pune has suddenly emerged as a high-donation centre, surpassing Mumbai. “Till April 2017, 69 donations took place in Maharashtra,” said Dr Gauri Rathod, Maharashtra’s nodal officer for organ donation.
Hyderabad and other districts of Telangana have crossed over 1,000 organ donations since 2013. From less than 1 per million population, the donation rate has now reached 4.4.From just 41 being recorded in 2013 to 106 organ donations in 2016. In 2017, over 80 organ donations have already been reported. “But there is an urgent need for education among doctors. In many cases, doctors are uncomfortable in declaring brain death. This is true of government hospitals,” says Dr G Swarnalatha, in-charge Jeevandan.

Karnataka, too, is charting its own success story with donations taking a leap from 18 in 2013 to 70 in 2016. Dr Kishore Phadke, convener at Jeevasarthakathe–the state organ transplant authority–attributes this to linked Aadhaar cards with pledging organs. ” Anyone who enrols for Aadhaar will be directed to the website of Jeevasarthakathe where they can pledge organs,” he says.

However, many states face unique problems. Consider Kerala which has recorded only 11 donations after 73 in 2016. “A doctor filed a PIL in the high court alleging hospitals are falsely declaring brain deaths to procure organs. It led to negative propaganda in the social media.Even government authorities didn’t stand by the transplant doctors,” says Dr Jose Chacko Periappuram of Lisie Hospital in Kochi. Kerala, however, has to its credit some of the unique organ transplants that include larynx, pancreas, small intestine and hand transplants.

Eastern India is the worst, with most states not having conducted cadaver donations at all.Only seven cadaver donations, including five in 2016, took place in West Bengal since 2012. According to Aditi Kishore Sarkar, state’s nodal officer for cadaver donation, “The drive to popularize organ donation through donor card distribution has failed.In 2017, there has not been a single cadaver organ transplant so far.” The state plans to introduce new laws to improve brain death screening.
Even states like Karnataka show a unhealthy skew . As Dr H Sudarshan Ballal, senior nephrologist and chairman at Manipal Hospitals, Bengaluru, says, “Of more than 300 transplants conducted by private hospitals, only 20% are cadaver organ transplants.” He says India needs more retrieval centres. “India’s largest centre of neuroscience, NIMHANS, is still not recognized as a retrieval centre.”


Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/life-style/health-fitness/health-news/organ-donation-up-4-fold-in-india-but-still-a-long-way-to-go/articleshow/59861347.cms

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