VietNamNet Bridge - A brain-dead person can help many others live through donation of the heart, liver, kidneys, cornea and other organs.

The patients who were transplanted with the heart and liver on Sept. 5.

Dr. Thai Minh Sam, from Cho Ray Hospital in HCM City, told VietNamNet that a dead body donated for medical use can help save up to 108 people.

If the person donates only the internal organs, eight people can be saved.

In Vietnam, multi-organ donations have saved the lives of many people.

The most special case of organ donation in Vietnam was a brain-dead person in HCM City whose internal organs saved the lives of six others in July.

This patient died in a labor accident at Cho Ray Hospital; the patient’s family decided to donate the corneas, heart, lungs, liver and kidneys.

The two kidneys and the liver were then transplanted into three patients in Cho Ray Hospital (a liver cancer patient and two patients suffering from end-stage chronic renal failure).

The heart and the lung were transported to the central city of Hue for transplantation in two patients in Hue on July 20.

The corneas were transplanted in the eyes of two poor patients on July 22.

This was the first time that Cho Ray Hospital had taken so many organs out of the body of one person. The three operations took place at the same time, several hours after the death of the donor, with the participation of over 100 doctors and technicians.

The doctors and nurses were divided into five groups: two took the organs from the dead patient and three others conducted the transplantation of the kidneys and liver.

The two patients who received the heart and lung died five days after the surgery but the others have recovered well.

The longest journey

After transporting organs for surgeries from HCM City to Hue in July (the first time that this had been done in Vietnam), a record was achieved: the longest trip for donated organs in Vietnam, which occurred on September 4. The heart and the liver of a donor were transported nearly 2,000km from HCM City to Hanoi to save two people.

A 31-year-old man donated his kidneys, heart and lung to Cho Ray Hospital. The two kidneys were transplanted into two patients at the hospital, while the heart and the liver were transported by air to Hanoi to save two others at the Vietnam-Germany Hospital.

At 2.30pm on September 4, a group of doctors of the Vietnam-Germany Hospital in Hanoi, led by two leading organ transplant surgeons – Prof. Trinh Hong Son and Prof. Nguyen Huu Phuoc - flew to Cho Ray Hospital to take the donated organs, with the assistance of over 50 local hospitals.

At 5.30pm, they completed the operation to take the donated organs, but not until 9pm did the flight take off; at 11.30pm the organs arrived at Hanoi’s Noi Bai Airport.

Doctors thought necrosis would set in after six hours of transport, but good luck smiled at both patients.

The two surgeries with more than 60 doctors and technicians were completed after 6.5 hours for the heart transplant and 7.5 hours for the liver transplant surgery, until about 5am on September 5.

Two of the patients are able to breathe, eat and drink, and all indices are nearly normal. They can also talk. If nothing changes, they will be discharged in 10 days.

Prof. Nguyen Tien Quyet, Director of the Organ Transplantation Center of the Vietnam-Germany Hospital, said since 2010 organ donations have saved several people at the same time in Vietnam. But the public did not know about them because the families of the donors wanted to keep them private.

Quyet said the first case was in 2010 when the organs of a dead-brain person were transplanted into four people.

In April 2011, the Vietnam - Germany Hospital performed four organ transplants at the same time on four people in three different provinces, including a heart transplant for a patient from Hai Phong, liver transplant for a patient in Hanoi, and two kidney transplants for a patient in Hanoi and a patient in HCM City.

In January 2012, the hospital again conducted four organ transplant surgeries, including two patients with kidney transplants, one with a heart transplant, and one with a liver transplant.

In late 2013, heart, liver, kidney and cornea transplant surgeries were conducted.

One patient received a heart and kidney at the Vietnam - Germany Hospital. but the patient died after one month.

The Vietnam - Germany Hospital is the country's leading clinic for organ transplants, with 25 of 27 of liver transplant cases in Vietnam, 11 of 12 heart transplants, and hundreds of kidney transplants.

Thuy Hanh - Thanh Huyen