No, Pak woman who received Indian heart in Chennai hospital didn't 'jump queue'; national authority cleared transplant

CHENNAI: When it was initially reported that a 19-year-old from Pakistan got a new lease of life by an Indian man’s heart after undergoing a successful transplant surgery at a hospital in Chennai, it spread joy, and, for a large section of people, optimism and even hope about a better, less divisive tomorrow. But that warm glow was rather short-lived, as the girl, the doctors who performed the surgery and even Tamil Nadu came under withering attack for not using an Indian’s organ on another Indian and instead using it on a foreigner – that too a Pakistani, stressed many a critic.

So, did she ‘jump the queue’ as is being alleged by several online comments? The short answer is no; she was on the waitlist for heart transplant for more than five years. Here is the full story.

Her story:

Ayesha Rashan underwent the heart transplant surgery at a private hospital in Chennai in January. But this was not the first time the teenager from Karachi benefitted from the healthcare facilities that the city boasts of.

In 2019, she was brought to Fortis Malar Hospital with complaints of breathlessness, vomiting and hypotension, and was diagnosed with dilated cardiomyopathy. She required a heart transplant, and was thus put on the organ recipient waitlist of the Transplant Authority of Tamil Nadu.

However, while waiting for a suitable organ, Ayesha suffered a sudden cardiac arrest leading to a heart failure. A team of doctors led by Dr KR Balakrishnan and Dr Suresh Rao KG, who were then with the Fortis Malar Hospital, decided to do the best available option: undertake an emergency procedure to implant a temporary left ventricular assist device (LVAD).

It helped save her life, but it was a temporary solution. Due to the uncertainty of an heart being available anytime soon, the doctors discussed the situation with her family and do another procedure to implant a device called a long duration heartware ventricular device (HVAD), essentially a pump – the smallest in the world that would suit the girl who was all of 14 years then – to keep her heart pumping blood till an organ is available.

Last June, she returned to India because the medical facilities there are not advanced enough to monitor the functioning of the device. Ayesha’s and her family’s desperate wait came to an end after five years when a Delhi man's heart was airlifted to Chennai, and she underwent the heart transplant at MGM Healthcare in Chennai in January.

Did she jump the queue?

When contacted for response to the allegation that a foreign national was given preference, the officials with the Transplant Authority of Tamil Nadu said an organ is transplanted on a foreigner only if no national recipient can accept it.

Also, the waitlist and selection process are overseen by the National Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation or NOTTO, the national-level authority under the Directorate General of Health Services, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, which maintains the registry of organs and tissues, and coordinates and networks their procurement and distribution.

"There is no possibility of any violation in this case. The organ allocation happens through NOTTO and the process is very transparent. The organ is allocated to foreigners on the waitlist only if there is no ideal Indian recipient who can match the donor heart at that given time. There does not seem to be any violation in the transplant performed in this case," said Dr N Gopalakrishnan, member-secretary, Transplant Authority of Tamil Nadu.

#WATCH | Tamil Nadu: A 19-year-old girl, Ayesha Rashid from Karachi, Pakistan, undergoes a successful heart transplant in Chennai. pic.twitter.com/LDQ1EqwkIn

— ANI (@ANI) April 26, 2024