Docs’ issues tabled as transplant panel meets

The first meeting of the newly constituted transplant committee was held on Monday which discussed some of the issues raised by the medical fraternity following the arrest of the five doctors in the recent kidney scam.

The issue came to light after the arrest of the doctors since the transplant laws say that they are also part of the verification process of the documents of the recipient and donor of the kidneys. This process has to be carried out in cases where the donor and the recipient are supposed to be related and the administration has to ensure that it is a genuine case.

Following the outcry by the doctors, the state government has set up a 16-member committee that comprises nephrologists, urologists, legal experts, the state director of health services, the state director of medical education and it is headed by the state health minister, Dr Deepak Sawant.

According to a senior nephrologist, who is part of the committee, they had an initial meeting today where the doctors brought their concerns to the notice of the administration. “We have communicated the fact that under no circumstance, doctors should be part of the verification process of the documents,” he said.

Officials of the state government have taken note of these points and a new law will be drafted taking this into consideration, sources said. “Doctors definitely do not want the transplant program to suffer and in fact we are making every effort to make this successful,” another surgeon said. But their area of expertise should be limited to patient care and carrying out the transplant and not about checking documents related to the process.

Confirming the development, Dr Mohan Jadhav, director of health services, said that they will finalise the Standard Operating Procedures for carrying out transplant in hospitals and the meeting was the first step in that direction. “We will do our best to minimise the role of doctors in verifying the documents and the draft is being prepared in this regard,” he revealed.