Boosting Organ Donation Awareness at Community Level

The number of chronic diseases is increasing in society today due to ignorance towards health, and carelessness in diet and lifestyle leading to complications such as high blood pressure, diabetes, liver, kidney and heart ailments.

People must be aware of their diet and lifestyle to prevent diseases rather than working to cure them later, said the Director of Shaheed Dharmabhakta National Transplant Center, Dr Pukarchandra Shrestha. He was speaking at an interaction on legal arrangements and implementation status of organ donation after brain death organised by the centre in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Health and Population.

He shared that the transplant centre has now started a social campaign for posthumous organ donation considering the need for organs to save the lives of people with severe diseases. The lives of many patients can be saved if people opt for organ donation and give prior permission for the same.

Due to the lack of public awareness, the organs that can be used after brain death are being wasted by either burning to ashes or burring. He suggested creating awareness among the general public at the community level as eight organs can be used for other people after brain death.

According to Dr Shrestha, 1,000 people die of brain death in Nepal every year and hence there is a possibility that 8,000 organs can be obtained in a year. "Eight people can get a life donation from one brain dead person," he said. Any healthy person can donate organs and the law now provides that transplants can be done through 52 kinds of relatives.

Also speaking at the programme, Dr Kalpana Shrestha said there is a possibility that even the brain can be preserved and transplanted within 24 hours after death. She also pointed out gender-based discrimination in kidney transplantation in Nepal. "The number of female kidney transplant patients receiving organs from men is very low", she said, "compared to this, the number of male patients receiving kidneys from women is very high."

Transplant specialist Dr Dipesh Shrestha and nephrologist Dr Shakti Basnet said that it is necessary to raise awareness about transplants in society.

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