VietNamNet Bridge - More than 150 doctors and nurses of the Military Medical Academy and Military Hospital 103 joined a multiple organ transplant operation (kidney - pancreas), the first in Vietnam.

The patient, a 43 military officer.

The patient is lieutenant Thai Pham Huyen, 43, a staff of the military command of Son La province.

At present, the patient is awake though he still uses a respiratory machine. The blood and kidney indexes are relatively normal.

Dr. Hoang Manh An, Military Hospital 103’s director, said the surgery took place on March 1, and lasted in 13 hours. More than 150 doctors participated in the surgery in four operating rooms. Along with this transplant case, doctors conducted a kidney and liver transplant for two other patients.

The organs for these operations were donated by a person who died in a traffic accident.

The patient suffered from type 1 diabetes and renal failure for over 10 years. Recently, the disease developed quickly so the patient fainted very often.

According to Dr. An, the initial success of the first pancreas-kidney transplant surgery opens great prospects to Vietnamese doctors to confirm their skills. With the organ transplant techniques, doctors will be able to save the lives of more serious cases. However, like other countries, the sources of donated organs are scarce.

The first heart transplant was successful performed by doctors of the Military Medical Academy and Military Hospital 108 in 2010.

The country has 13 doctors that are permitted to perform the transplant of tissue or body parts. The cost of an organ transplant surgery in Vietnam is very cheap, only one quarter compared to that in many developed countries.

The demand for transplant organs in Vietnam is huge. The country has 6,000 people with chronic kidney failure who need a kidney transplant and 5,000 people are waiting for corneal transplants. Particularly in some large hospitals in Hanoi, at least over 1,500 people need liver transplantation.

Le Ha