Delhi police created a 23 km green corridor to enable an ambulance transport a heart (Representational)
Delhi police created a 23 km green corridor in New Delhi to enable an ambulance transport a heart meant for a 63-year-old man suffering from heart failure, in 19 minutes.
The heart was harvested from a brain-dead patient in Bengaluru.
The green corridor, manned by 70 police personnel, ensured that no vehicles could come ahead of the ambulance as it travelled between New Delhi's Indira Gandhi International Airport and the Fortis Escorts Heart Institute (FEHI).
"We were certainly happy to help. All the necessary help that we could was provided. About 20 of our policemen were deployed and 50 from the traffic police," Deputy Commissioner of Police, Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGI) Sanjay Bhatia told IANS.
The patient was diagnosed with DCM (Dilated Cardiomyopathy) EF-20 per cent and had been admitted to the hospital multiple times with features of heart failure. He was suggested for 'Advance Heart Failure Treatment', according to Vishal Rastogi, Head, Heart Failure Programme, at the FEHI.
"A heart transplant is a critical surgery where timing is a key factor. We have a window period of five hours in which we had to retrieve the heart from Bengaluru, transport it to FEHI Delhi and perform the heart transplant surgery," said ZS Meharwal, Director, Cardio Vascular Surgery, FEHI.
The heart had been harvested from a 15-year-old male who had been declared brain-dead at Fortis Hospital in Karnataka's Bengaluru.
Once the donor's heart was available, FEHI's Heart Failure Clinic team flew to Bengaluru to retrieve the heart.
"Our retrieval team coordinated very closely with the transplant team at FEHI. We are grateful to NOTTO (National Organ & Tissue Transplant Organisation) for their continuous support for organ donation and transplant programme," Mr Meharwal added.
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