Hands that bind: Cadaveric donors’ family meet organ recipients at Kochi hospital

It was an emotionally charged situation in a Kochi hospital on Wednesday when organ recipients met the family of their cadaver donors. There were tears—of sadness and joy both—when four families were linked by coincidence as well as scientific marvel.

A few months ago, in bilateral hand transplants, 25-year-old Amaresh, who hails from Karnataka, was given the hands of Kollam-native, 54-year-old Vinod, who died in a road accident earlier this year.

Alappuzha native Ambily, who died at the age of 39 in a road accident, became hand donor after her death to 29-year-old Yousif Hasan from Iraq.

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The transplants were done at the Centre for Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery of Amrita Hospital in Kochi. The meeting of cadaveric donors’ relatives and the recipients were organised as per their wishes.

Family members of Vinod and Ambily were quite emotional—they kissed the hands of Amaresh and Hasan, as they once belonged to their departed ones.

Amaresh and Hasan, too, expressed their gratitude to the families for giving their consent for the cadaver transplant. Both Amaresh and Hasan lost their hands due to electrocution. Amaresh used to work with Gulbarga Electricity Supply Company, and Hasan worked with an interior design firm.

Dr Subramania Iyer, who led the team that performed the transplant, said that shoulder level transplant was required for one hand of Amaresh. Hence it was more complicated. Only a few such transplants had been performed anywhere in the world so far, he said in a statement from the hospital.