On March 10, 2024 (Sunday), MOHAN Foundation was invited to conduct an ICU Workshop with MMC (Maharashtra Medical Council) credit points, in partnership with ZTCC Pune, for Sahyadri Group of Hospitals in Pune, at Regal Hall, Ramee Grand Hotel & Spa, Pune. This event was attended by 160 participants of which 130 were doctors from the Critical care setup of their group of hospitals and around 30 coordinators, nurses and admin representatives attended.

The event began at 9.30AM with an introductory speech by Col (retd) Dr Sunil Rao, COO, followed by lamp lighting by dignitaries. Ms. Jaya Jairam, Project Director at MOHAN Foundation began with an overview of Deceased Donation scenario in India, followed by Ms. Sujata Ashtekar, Consultant ROTTO-SOTTO, Mumbai, who spoke on Legal framework in India. In order to stress on the importance of Corneal and Skin donation post circulatory or brain death, the CME included talks by Dr Pranav More, Ophthalmologist and Dr Jaysing Shinde, Skin Bank incharge at Surya Hospital.

This was followed by extremely engaging talks by Dr Rahul Pandit, an expert in critical care with vast experience in declaration of brain death, on topics of Brain stem death identification and Certification, Maintenance of Potential Brain Dead donor and Discussions on Common pitfalls and practical considerations in Brain death certifications. The session was extremely interactive with a lot of questions asked and discussed.

After the Lunch break, Ms Jaya Jairam and Dr Rahul Pandit conducted an engaging activity that highlighted the number of activities and need for effective Role Allocation when having a Brain dead donor in the ICU. Thereafter, MOHAN Foundation’s short simulation film on Brain death Testing was shown and another Activity called ‘Understanding Brain Death’ was conducted. Ms Jaya then spoke on Grief Counselling and Making the Ask for Organ donation. This was followed by MOHAN Foundations’ film on ‘Right and Wrong Approach to Counselling for Organ donation’.

Ms Arati Gokhale, Senior Transplant Coordinator of ZTCC Pune then spoke on Role of ZTCC and Allocation of Organs. Lastly, a Panel Discussion was moderated by Sahyadri Hospital’s Director ICU, Dr Kapil Borwake and the panelists were administrative representatives, Neurologists, Intensivists, Nephrologist, Liver Transplant Surgeon and Heart Transplant expert. The discussions lead to a conclusion that while the team members were extremely motivated towards organ donations, there were challenges, as in any setup and it was brought out that the hospital must have a policy of meeting regularly for reviewing and discussing each stakeholder’s challenges, so as to put in place a robust program.

MOHAN Foundation is thankful to Sahyadri Super Specialty Hospitals for organizing such a meaningful workshop