Kilpauk Medical College gets south India’s first tissue bank

Speaking at the event, the minister said that the government is fully committed to the organ donation programmes.

He alluded to the growing number of patients who await organ transplants and expressed hope that such initiatives will come to their aid. As part of this project, the government has taken into cognizance that burn victims who receive skin for grafting from the deceased or patients who are brain dead, have been found to recover faster and experience less pain.

With this in mind, the Transplant Authority of Tamil Nadu (TRANSTAN) and the National Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation (NOTTO) have come together to establish the tissue bank with an investment of Rs 100 crore.

The tissue bank aims to improve the quality of life of burn victims. The tissue bank will employ experts who collect skin from eligible donors and preserve it to be matched in the future with patients in need. The success of this initiative will hinge on more people signing for organ and tissue donation.

Two more tissue banks are to be established in Madurai and Tirunelveli. The inauguration was attended by the Director of Central Government’s National Organ Transplant Program (NOTP) Dr Vimal Bhandari, Principal Secretary of Ministry of Health and Family Welfare Dr J Radhakrishnan,

Directors of the Organ Transplant Programmes of the states of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Telangana, Kerala, Andaman and Pondicherry, Dr Rajasabapathi of Ganga Hospitals, Coimbatore and Dr Balaji, Member Secretary of Transplant Authority of Tamil Nadu (TRANSTAN), and other officials.