On 2^nd July 2014 Mrithasanjeevani (KNOS) and MOHAN Foundation organized an open forum for transplant coordinators at Hotel Residency Tower in Trivandrum. The main agenda of the session was to address the problems faced by transplant coordinators in coordinating deceased organ donation at their hospitals.

The meeting started with  an self introduction. Dr. Noble Gracious, Nodal Officer, KNOS introduced KNOS and MOHAN Foundation team to the group. From the participant side Ms. Soumya Begum, Transplant Coordinator from Anthapuri Hospital shared her difficulties that she faced during deceased donation process. Some points she raised were: 

• lack of awareness on brain death and early identification of a potential brain death patient  among staff nurse at ICU
• poor cooperation from both administrative and hospital side.
• no  in house protocol or system running in the hospital to promote brain death donation and donor maintenance. 

Nodal officer  assured  that Mrithasanjeevani will address the administration level problems.  He said that Mrithasanjeevani will provide counseling services for hospitals not registered for organ transplanation if necessary.  He added that it will help the deceased donor program if a  good reporting system  is developed on -  brain death identified, counseled and converted to organ donation.

Ms. Soumya Begum requested nodal officer that they want to conduct an awareness session on organ donation at their hospital. Nodal officer agreed and replied that after getting written request from hospital administrator, KNOS can do the needful.

Ms. Subhalakshmi Transplant Coordinator from PRS Hospital Trivandrum raised the same points  mentioned by Ms. Soumya. As per the request from Ms Subhalakshmi, sensitization programme on brain death donation is scheduled on third week of July 2014.

Mr. Shabeer from KIMS Hospital reported that:

• They have fully fledged system in their hospitals for cadaver donation process. But in some cases they faced difficulty in getting consent.  
•  For corneal donation they facing difficulty from Eye hospital, Regional Institute of Ophthalmology (RIO) since take time to reach the hospital to retrieve cornea.
• He suggested that public awareness is essential to increase the deceased donation rate.

Mr. Ajith, From Sree Gokulam Medical College, Trivandrum, pointed that lack of cooperation from hospital management stands as a major difficulty and also he suggested that  an awareness  can spread through the political party  campaigns and it will help to penetrate into the public very easily.

Followed by the discussion Nodal officer presented the following aspects;

• Importance of hospital committee and clinical lead in organ donation to streamline the process
• Importance of maintaining a Database on survival rates, hospital wise donation and transplant etc.

Nodal officer recommended  to the group to increase the rate of corneal donation and maintain the brain death reporting system.

The participants expressed their gratitude and happiness towards KNOS and MOHAN Foundation in conducting such an interactive session which helped them to identify and sort out the issues that they face during cadaver organ donation.