In Magnanimity Gesture, Parents Donate Their Brain Dead Infant’s Organs to Save 2 Other Lives

Bhubaneswar: In a magnanimity gesture, parents of a 21-month-old baby boy, who was declared brain dead at AIIMS hospital in Odisha’s Bhubaneswar, donated their child’s organs to save two other lives. Following their decision to donate the organs, two patients admitted at hospitals in Delhi and Bhubaneswar are likely to get new life. Meanwhile, the parents’ humanitarian gesture has been winning applause all across social media.

The infant’s parents are identified as Gouri Shankar Panigrahi and Sharmistha Panigrahi, both residents of Bhubaneswar and are city-based artists. It is being said that the baby, who was born in July 2022, had developed health issues subsequently and felt sick intermittently.

Baby was diagonsed with meningitis

Following which the parents of the baby brought him to the hospital and where after a long course of treatment the baby recovered.

A senior doctor of the hospital stated that about a fortnight ago, the infant was again admitted to the hospital, where he was diagnosed with meningitis. He was admitted to the ICU and was being treated, during which the baby suffered septic shock and was declared brain dead on Saturday.

After the child’s declaration as brain dead, the infant’s parents expressed their desire to donate the organs of the baby to help other patients elsewhere requiring transplant.

The hospital authorities passed on the information to the State Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation (SOTTO) who, in turn, got in touch with the National Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation (NOTTO) to take the matter forward.

It was decided that the liver of the infant would be flown to the Institute of Liver and Biliary Sciences (ILBS) at New Delhi for a baby awaiting transplantation, while the kidneys were taken to a city-based hospital for another patient needing a transplant.

A team from AIIMS Bhubaneswar harvested the liver to be taken to New Delhi for which the police had prepared a green corridor for smooth passage to Bhubaneswar’s Biju Patnaik Airport.

The mother of the baby later said that though she was heartbroken as her baby did not survive, she got consolation from the fact that the organs of her child would help another baby live on elsewhere.