Kolkata’s SSKM Hospital became the first hospital in Eastern India to receive a go-ahead for a hand transplant surgery, local media reported, quoting hospital authorities.

Building upon the expertise gained in re-joining hands and fingers lost during an accident, the Department of Plastic Surgery of the Hospital decided to augment the infrastructure for hand transplantation and is currently awaiting a cadaver donor, the hospital sources said.

However, the question remains regarding the visible disfiguration that is bound to happen compared to organ donations involving the heart, lungs, kidneys or eyes, which are internal organs.

According to the Head of the Department of Plastic Surgery, Professor (Dr) Arindam Sarkar, in case of a brain-dead patient, an artificial hand resembling the real one will be put in place and for that, the patient’s relatives need to be counselled.

Sources at the hospital said that the hospital received a go-ahead for hand transplantation in January 2019, making it the second public sector hospital after JIPMER, Puducherry to receive permission to perform hand transplantation.

Noting that the recipient will need to be on immunosuppressant drugs post-transplantation, the doctors informed that the annual cost of such drugs, amounting to be around one to two lakh Rupees, will be provided by the state government.

According to doctors in the case of brain-dead patients, the heart is the first organ that is harvested, but, in case the relatives of the deceased agree to donate a hand, it will need to be harvested first.

Meanwhile, a short film titled ‘Roto’, filmed at SSKM Hospital, highlighting the importance of hand transplantation, produced by the Regional Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation has been selected for screening at the 8-day Kolkata International Film Festival, from December 15, 2022.