World Sikh News en­dorses this ap­peal by cel­e­brated poet and au­thor in mul­ti­ple lan­guages to the gen­eral pub­lic to know more about the need and facts about eye and or­gan do­na­tion. The au­thor through his writ­ings and ac­tivism has been prop­a­gat­ing this for long. This is the first of a 2-ar­ti­cle se­ries. The sec­ond one car­ries the Sikh view­point on or­gan do­na­tion. 

Saving lives through or­gan do­na­tion is still a field which is not fully un­der­stood de­spite the ad­van­tage to the teem­ing mil­lions who need it. Hu­mankind has to do much more in this area to pro­vide eye-sight and life to those in dire straits.  A be­gin­ning has been made but more more needs to be done. 

Here is a sum­mary of the rea­sons why do­na­tion of eyes and other vi­tal or­gans can make a vast dif­fer­ence in the In­dian sub­con­ti­nent.

Eye Do­na­tion –a Fact­sheet

1. In­dia has the largest num­ber of blind peo­ple in the world. Wrong be­liefs and su­per­sti­tions are re­spon­si­ble for in­dif­fer­ence to­wards eye do­na­tion.
2. Eye re­moval does not de­lay the fu­neral since the en­tire pro­ce­dure takes only 20-30 min­utes.
3. Eye do­na­tion gives sight to two blind per­sons by Corneal Graft, be­cause in our coun­try one blind per­son is given one eye at a time due to acute short­age.  This en­ables you to con­tinue to be part of this world even af­ter death.
4. Af­ter death every hu­man be­ing of any age any­one from the age of one can do­nate. There is no age-limit for do­nat­ing the eye.  
5. Every­one can do­nate eyes, even if blind by birth, even if wear­ing glasses, even if one has un­der­gone an eye op­er­a­tion or even if one has some eye dis­ease. It should be left to the med­ical fra­ter­nity to make an as­sess­ment of each in­di­vid­ual case.  
6. In case of death by burns, lep­rosy, can­cer, dog bite, snake bite, jaun­dice, HIV AIDS and drown­ing, eyes are not use­ful for trans­plan­ta­tion.
7. The cornea of the eye has to be re­moved within 6 hours of the per­son af­ter death. So, upon death, no time should be lost in in­form­ing the near­est Eye Hos­pi­tal or Eye Bank of the area con­cerned.
8. Upon death, switch-off fans (the air con­di­tioner can be kept on) and close the eye­lids. Place  wet cot­ton or a wet cloth over the eyes.  It will keep the eye­balls moist.  Raise the head with a pil­low.
9. The body need not be taken to the Eye Hos­pi­tal or Eye Bank. On in­form­ing the Eye Hos­pi­tal or Eye Bank, the doc­tors team will come to the spot at their own cost.
10. The cornea is the clear cir­cu­lar trans­par­ent por­tion at the front of the eye­ball. This is taken out care­fully, with­out leav­ing any scar or dis­fig­ur­ing the face and keep­ing the eye­balls in­tact. It takes only 10-15 min­utes for this process.
11. A 10 c.c.  blood sam­ple is col­lected from the donor’s dead body for test­ing.
12. Eye Banks are non-profit ser­vice or­gan­i­sa­tions. The col­lected cornea is ex­am­ined, pre­served and used for trans­plan­ta­tion within 72 hours ac­cord­ing to the wait­ing list. So you need not doubt about their in­tegrity and the right­ful use of your do­na­tion.
13. Sim­ply the act of your pledg­ing may not en­sure that your wish will be ful­filled. It is also not nec­es­sary for the donor to reg­is­ter his/​her pledge ear­lier for eye do­na­tion dur­ing his life. Ad­di­tion­ally, this is not likely to be the first thing to strike the be­reaved fam­ily. There­fore ed­u­ca­tion and in­struc­tion prior to death are nec­es­sary. 
14. In ad­di­tion to let­ting your rel­a­tives know, you should also tell your friends, spir­i­tual lead­ers, and your at­tor­ney (if you have one). This will help en­sure that there are no un­cer­tain­ties about your de­ci­sion.
15. Do some­thing now it­self to make sure that when the time comes, your eyes will ac­tu­ally be do­nated. For this sa­cred cause dis­cuss eye do­na­tion with your fam­ily mem­bers and con­vince them. They must take the re­spon­si­bil­ity to in­form im­me­di­ately to the Eye Hos­pi­tal/​Eye Bank af­ter death. Your mere wish will be im­ma­te­r­ial, un­less your fam­ily mem­bers make up their mind for do­na­tion and act ac­cord­ingly. 
16. In the un­likely event that your do­na­tion can­not be used for trans­plants (due to med­ical com­pli­ca­tions), with your fam­i­ly’s con­sent, your do­na­tion can still be used for med­ical ed­u­ca­tion and trans­plant re­search.

  Blood Do­na­tion -A Fact­sheet

1. Blood is the elixir of life. It is not only life, but also saves and gives life to oth­ers. It is needed for those who have lost blood due to ac­ci­dents, dis­eases or surgery.
2. Blood do­na­tion is noth­ing but a sa­cred ser­vice and a sym­bol of hu­man­ity. Any healthy man or woman can do­nate reg­u­larly af­ter every 12 weeks with­out any loss of their body re­quire­ment.
3. Blood do­na­tion is a pain­less process, which is com­pleted within few min­utes.
4. Hu­man body main­tains its level of blood. Dur­ing blood do­na­tion only 350 c.c. of blood is taken, which is re­plen­ished in the body in a very short time. The donor will not feel any loss or weak­ness even af­ter five Min­utes.
5. Vol­un­tary Blood Donors are given Donors Cards and Cer­tifi­cates Of Ap­pre­ci­a­tion. They will also get blood on pri­or­ity, when they need it for them­selves or for their near­est kin.  
6. Con­sider do­nat­ing blood and mar­row while you’re still liv­ing. These do­na­tions help peo­ple in re­ju­ve­nate their life.

Kid­ney Do­na­tion -A Fact­sheet
Gen­er­ally peo­ple have two kid­neys and a per­son can com­fort­ably live with one kid­ney. The kid­neys per­form cru­cial func­tions that af­fect all parts of the body. Var­i­ous dis­eases can af­fect kid­ney func­tion. Kid­ney dam­age, apart from other rea­sons is also a side ef­fect of med­ica­tion, par­tic­u­larly painkillers taken for headache back­ache, joint pains etc.  You could do­nate one kid­ney to your loved ones who are in need and could do a good be­fore your end…. and live even af­ter life.

“On 13 Jan­u­ary 2016, twin-hand trans­plant was con­ducted at Kochi, Ker­ala, on an Army cap­tain Ab­dul Rahim, 30 of Afghanistan, who had lost both hands dur­ing dem­i­ning op­er­a­tions three years ago. He goes back to Afghanistan with In­dian hands. Thank God and the med­ical fra­ter­nity and of course the coura­geous fam­ily for their do­na­tion. ”

On 30 Sep­tem­ber 2009, 55 year-old Fr. Davis Chi­ramel went one step ahead of just preach­ing love… he acted it… he gave one out of the two kid­neys he had… to a com­plete stranger Hindu, at Kochi, Ker­ala. He has mo­ti­vated many a pub­lic lu­mi­nary to con­tribute to the cause of or­gan do­na­tion in In­dia. K J Yesu­das, noted play­back singer is now an Am­bas­sador of the Kid­ney Foun­da­tion of In­dia. This set off a chain re­ac­tion in the so­ci­ety with con­tri­bu­tions pour­ing in plenty for trans­plants and peo­ple pledg­ing do­na­tion in thou­sands.

So far, 15 priests and six nuns have do­nated kid­neys to non-re­lated re­cip­i­ents through the or­gan do­na­tion net­work Kid­ney Fed­er­a­tion of In­dia.

Or­gan Do­na­tion of Brain Dead 

1. When we see an ac­tive pulse, a warm body and a beat­ing heart, fam­i­lies think there is still a pos­si­bil­ity of the pa­tient com­ing back to life.  It is dif­fi­cult for the at­ten­dants to ac­cept brain death.  Com­mon per­cep­tion is that a per­son dies only when the heart­beat stops. In fact com­plete and ir­re­versible loss of all brain func­tions is es­sen­tial for a per­son to be de­clared clin­i­cally and legally dead, and is to be cer­ti­fied by doc­tor.
2. In case of ac­ci­dent, brain­stem death is re­spon­si­ble for brain death.  Such pa­tients do not re­gain con­scious­ness, al­though their heart con­tin­ues to beat and blood cir­cu­la­tion is main­tained. For all other pur­poses they are clin­i­cally dead.  The mo­ment their breath­ing sup­port ma­chine is with­drawn, they die. The or­gans of such brain dead per­son i.e., Ca­dav­eric Donor, can be do­nated for trans­plan­ta­tion to sev­eral needy per­sons.  The or­gans can be pre­served only for a few hours be­fore they are trans­planted to the re­cip­i­ents free of cost. The Trans­plan­ta­tion Of Hu­man Or­gans Amend­ment Act 2011, has given a big push to or­gan do­na­tion.  The donors need not pay any­thing, only the re­cip­i­ents have to pay the hos­pi­tal charges.  The sale and pur­chase of or­gans is strictly pro­hib­ited and an of­fense at­tract­ing jail sen­tence.
3. Con­vince the fam­ily mem­bers to do­nate your or­gans and tis­sues for sav­ing the lives of other in­di­vid­u­als who are fac­ing im­mi­nent death.  In­ci­sions to re­move or­gans are made at places where cloth­ing cov­ers the body.  It does not cause any dis­fig­ure­ment and does not in­ter­fere in any way with the cus­tom­ary fu­neral. The hos­pi­tal in which the donor is un­der treat­ment is the proper agency to guide.
4. Presently, al­most 37 dif­fer­ent or­gans and tis­sues can be har­vested in­clud­ing the most im­por­tant ones. Cornea, Blood, Skin, Bone, Bone mar­row, Liver, Kid­neys, Heart, Lungs, Pan­creas, In­testines, Car­ti­lages and many other parts are be­ing trans­planted. Even one such do­na­tion can help more than 40 needy pa­tients and save their lives.

For ex­am­ple, on 13th Jan­u­ary 2016, twin-hand trans­plant was con­ducted at Kochi, Ker­ala, on an Army cap­tain Ab­dul Rahim, 30 of Afghanistan, who had lost both hands dur­ing de-min­ing op­er­a­tions three years ago. He goes back to Afghanistan with In­dian hands. He had de­fused about 2,000 mines in his ca­reer.

The credit for the trans­plant should equally go to the doc­tors and the fam­ily who gra­ciously agreed to do­nate his limbs. Ab­dul Rahim had ap­proached the hos­pi­tal four months back, at the end of a search for hand trans­plant in many other coun­tries. His pic­ture is a trib­ute to hu­man­ity and the med­ical fra­ter­nity.

Body Do­na­tion  -A Fact­sheet
In med­ical col­leges, stu­dents re­quire dead bod­ies for dis­sec­tion to study the hu­man anatomy.  Only a very few un­claimed dead bod­ies are avail­able for them, as body donors are very rare.  So stu­dents in a large group work on one body due to the scarcity. Peo­ple should come for­ward to do­nate their dead body to the near­est Med­ical Col­lege for the pur­pose of in­ten­sive learn­ing of the stu­dents.  For such do­na­tion, the Head of the Anatomy De­part­ment of the near­est Med­ical Col­lege should be con­tacted dur­ing life and a de­c­la­ra­tion to this ef­fect should be sub­mit­ted to avoid any con­tro­ver­sies by their rel­a­tives later on, apart from ad­vis­ing their own fam­ily mem­bers.  Arrange­ments should be made to hand over the dead body to the same Med­ical Col­lege.

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Re­ceiv­ing an or­gan do­na­tion is easy, do­nat­ing is also easy. Make up your mind and take the first next step of sign­ing a pledge. It is an op­por­tu­nity to live even af­ter death. Don’t lose the chance.