Ghaziabad: Traffic police created a 20km green corridor on Wednesday to facilitate a heart transplant from Hindon Civil Terminal to Noida. The organ was transported in 16 minutes to Fortis Hospital in Noida Sector 62.The heart was harvested from a 34-year-old woman — declared brain-dead — and transplanted into a 62-year-old man suffering from heart disease.Fortis Heart & Vascular Institute chairman Ajay Kaul told TOI that Tapas, a retired govt employee, had a very bad heart condition, adding, “50% of his heart was not working”. Tapas’ treatment has been underway in the hospital since April. His health was in such poor shape that he had to be hospitalised every two to three months. In fact, there were times when he remained admitted for as long as 20 days.“In June, the first week, we registered him for a heart transplant,” Kaul said, adding, “On Tuesday night, we learnt about a woman at Army Command Hospital in Haryana who had been declared brain-dead, but whose heart was completely healthy. She had also expressed a wish to donate her organs. A team was assembled under the leadership of Gaurav Sharma — who heads the heart centre at Fortis Hospital — consisting of surgeons, anesthetists and other medical staff. At 3am, the team flew to Panchkula and after completing all the necessary paperwork, the heart was transported by the team in a private jet to Hindon Airport in Ghaziabad. It was then brought to the hospital at 2.30pm.”“We were prepared in the operating room and as soon as the donor heart arrived, we immediately removed the patient’s heart and implanted the new one. We successfully carried out the heart transplant and the patient is now in stable condition,” Ajay said.Sharma said the team reached Chandigarh airport around 5am on Wednesday. After collecting the heart from Army Command Hospital with necessary precautions, the team returned to Chandigarh airport at 1pm and reached Hindon terminal at 2pm. The team transported the heart to the hospital within 16 minutes.“For this patient, we tried several times to perform a heart transplant, but each time the donor heart deteriorated immediately after being removed from the donor’s body,” Sharma said.“Previously, I had completed such missions eight times in my seven years of career in Delhi Fortis hospital. In the past, finding a donor was extremely difficult, but over the last few years, people have become more aware and are now donating organs. Earlier, it often took more than a year for people to find a donor,” Gaurav said.ADCP (traffic, Ghaziabad) Varun Kumar Singh told TOI that around 10am, we received a request for a green corridor through an email from Fortis hospital in Noida. “We created a green corridor for the heart and more than a hundred traffic police personnel along with police stations concerned were deployed for the mission,” he said.DCP (traffic, Noida) Abhay Mishra said that from Noida border, Noida traffic police picked up the team from the hospital and took them to Fortis hospital.
