Organ donation awareness at Tagore Medical College and Hospital, Chennai

MOHAN Foundation was invited for an Organ Donation Awareness by the Department of Pathology of Tagore Medical College and Hospital on 13^th April 2017. Dr. Hemal Kanvinde, Mr. T. S. Siva Shankar & Mr. Ruban Victor represented MOHAN Foundation. The awareness was for the 300 students, 2^nd and 3^rd year students of the medical college.

In the morning the students had set up information counters and games based on organ donation. Students invited MOHAN Foundation team for small games. There were two simultaneous sessions. The Awareness session began at 10.30am with a 10 minute video on the history of Organ Donation in Tamil Nadu. Then there was a talk on the concepts and followed by a short video on Brain Stem testing. Dr. Hemal Kanvinde conducted one session and Mr. Siva Shankar and Mr. Ruban Victor conducted the other. Both sessions ended with a quiz.

To start the talk with a base on donation Mr. Siva Shankar asked “who are all blood donors?” Then he started with the activities and history of MOHAN Foundation. The main part in the presentation was about what, when, who and why on Organ Donation and what is Brain Death? Faculty of the hospital also participated in the session and gave their experiences with organ donation.

The session went on for half an hour and next was the Q & A session.

Is it possible to donate organs to unrelated patients?
If private hospital has donor how is organ allocation done?

The answers were given in a perfect way to the audience as the students understood it clearly.

Some students were really sad that there were many myths on organ donation and they would like to change the society that thinks on organ donation. Many students took a promise that they will change the way society thinks on organ donation and pledged their organs. Around 200 students took a pledge to donate their organs and picked a donor card.

MOHAN Foundation thanks Mr. Selva Kumar of 3^rd year who on his birthday, took this social cause forward to make his friends and college to know on organ donation. MOHAN Foundation also thanks the Dean and the staff of the Department of Pathology who made this program possible.