Overview
Transplant surgery is the field of advanced surgical sciences where the diseased organ is replaced by healthy organ obtained from the living donors or brain dead donors. This field of surgery have extensively developed over last decades and involve expertise teams, management protocols and infrastructure to perform these surgeries with utmost precision.
Common types of organ transplantation
- Kidney ( most common)
- Liver ( second most common)
- Lung
- Pancreas
- Heart
- Intestinal transplant
- Cornea transplantation
- Skin transplant
Types of Donors
- Living Donors – The organs are retrieved from the living individuals like siblings, spouse, friends and family members commonly to replace the diseased organs. This is most commonly done for kidney and liver transplantation.
- Deceased Donors- The organs are retrieved from the brain dead individuals or immediately after declaration of death after the consent is obtained by the family members to donate the organs. These organs are retrieved, preserved and transplantation done with in some hours of obtain organs. Most of the organs are obtained by deceased donors like liver, lung, pancreas, cornea and heart.
Common indications of organ transplantation
The most common indication for organ transplant surgery are
- End stage kidney or liver disease
- Patients not responding to medications and other treatment
- Multiple metabolic disease like diabetes and hypertension damaging the organs
- Congenital or acquired conditions like cardiomyopathy, restrictive lung disease, interstitial lung disease not responding to medical treatments.
- Poor quality of life with medical management like repeated hospital admissions, repeated procedures and dialysis etc.
Investigations and treatment
It’s important for patients to understand the consequences of the long standing disease and medical treatment they undergo and always discuss with there clinicians and surgeons about various pro and cons for transplant surgery as it involves specialised surgery, hospital stay and stringent follow up for management.
Usually initial evaluation involves blood investigation, listing your self as transplant candidate, donor matching, immune compatibility testings and approval from organisations and transplant authorities. Radiological evaluation is done to assess the various aspects of donor organs in living donors who are planned to undergo surgery for donation of kidney and liver.
Transplant surgery
As mentioned earlier transplant surgery is team work and the length of the surgery depends upon the organ to be transplanted. Usually the patients and donors are kept in intensive care unit after surgery for adequate recovery and strict monitoring of the patients. Medications and immunosuppressive medications are prescribed after surgery to prevent donor organ rejection
Most of transplant surgeries are performed by routine conventional open surgery approach. Minimal invasive surgery for donor in case of kidney and liver transplantation can be performed by highly specialised surgeons with expertise. This approach give benefit of early recovery to the patients.
Outcomes of transplant surgery
- patients become disease free
- Quality of life improves significantly
- They can live almost normal life
To consult with best surgeon for your transplant surgery related queries, General surgery and laparoscopic surgery ( Dr Saurabh Bansal). Please fill the contact information for appointment.
You can also click the link www.thesurgeonshouse.com for various SHL surgical teams available at different global locations.