DAAN – “Donate Organs, Donate Life” is a joint initiative campaign by HCL Technologies Ltd, Apollo Group of Hospitals, Chennai Police, Indian Medical Association (IMA), Cadaver Transplant Programme (Govt. of Tamil Nadu) and MOHAN Foundation.
DAAN is one of the largest organ donation campaigns in the country. During the first phase of the project, we sensitized employees of all partners through face-to-face interactions, electronic media and distribution of IEC material. Following this, a record number of 12,900 organ donation pledges was received on 29th February 2012 from across the country. Around 3463 HCL employees, 5127 representatives of IMA, 861 officials of Chennai Police including Mr.J.K.Tripathy, I.P.S, Commissioner of Police, Chennai and Mr. Sanjay Arora, Addl Commissioner of Police, Traffic with family and 3500 employees of Apollo Group of Hospitals pledged to donate their organs. This significant response from the corporate, public and government sector has created hope for increasing the support base for deceased organ donation.
In order to carry this message to society, the DAAN team called for a press conference on 27th March 2012.
Ms.Srimathi Shivashankar, AVP & Head – Diversity & Sustainability, HCL Technologies said, “The employees are conscious about their responsibilities to society and believe that individual contributions can make a mammoth difference in terms of ushering a positive change.”
Mr.Sivanandhan, ADC Planning Traffic said that they were happy to be part of this programme and that through this campaign they had clearly understood their role in brain death and organ donation cases. He spoke about how the police could facilitate the speedy transport of organs through establishing a green corridor.
IMA State President Dr.K.Prakasam and State Secretary Dr.J.A.Jayalal extended their support from the state body which is the largest network of medicos.
“Gift a Life” is a public interest initiative for organ donation by the Apollo Group of Hospitals. Ms.Mythili Sriram and Ms.Jayanthi said that being a part of Project DAAN had extended the reach of this initiative tremendously.
Dr. Amalorpavanathan, Convenor, Cadaver Transplant Programme (Govt. of Tamil Nadu) said, “In the second phase of this campaign we need to strengthen the government hospital infrastructure in order to help poor patients receive a lifesaving transplant free of cost.”
According to Dr. Sunil Shroff, Founder, MOHAN Foundation “We have more than 210000 kidney failure patients waiting for transplant in which only 3500 patients get transplanted. Even worse is the case with liver and other organ transplantation. Only about 700 liver transplantations are being done annually and less than 100 patients requiring heart transplantation are being supported in our country today. The paucity of organ donation in our country can largely be attributed to surrounding myths and lack of awareness. Project DAAN envisages demystifying the myths and enhancing awareness.”
Dr. Sumana Navin, Course Director, MOHAN Foundation spoke about creating positive public will for organ donation. Since 1997, the Foundation has worked tirelessly with public education as well as developing a network among the hospitals to share organs. A special campaign to include a clause on organ donation in the driving license was initiated some years ago. She emphasized the importance of public-private partnership in the deceased organ donation programme. Trained transplant coordinators of MOHAN Foundation have been deputed to Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital, Chennai to provide counseling services and to coordinate organ donation process, free of cost. This service has contributed to an organ donation rate of 1.3 per million population in Tamil Nadu. This is almost 15 times the national organ donation rate of 0.08.
Ms. Veena, Transplant Coordinator, MOHAN Foundation shared her experience in counseling families of brain dead patients at Rajiv Gandhi Govt. General Hospital, Chennai. She got an opportunity to thank Mr. Ramesh, Inspector, Guindy Police Station for his support and speedy work in completing the legal process in organ donation that took place on 26th March 2012.
DAAN project has created a major impact among the employees. Mr. Shelvamani, an employee of HCL shared his experience in motivating his family members to donate his brother’s organs at a private hospital in Chennai just recently. Truly a remarkable family…
Mr. Rahul Ganapathy (CSC enabler, HCl) Project DAAN initiator thanked all the partners and the media. After successful completion of phase-1, the team now envisages taking this awareness campaign to like-minded organizations. Rahul also announced the vision of project DAAN-phase 2 was to create a National Organ Donation Pledge Day and a massive organ donation database for India.
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