India News | No Emergency Case Refused to Keep Patient in Isolation Post Heart Transplant: RML Hospital

New Delhi, Sep 6 (PTI) Amid reports that surgeries of other heart patients were halted for 10 days at the RML Hospital for keeping a patient who had undergone a heart transplant in isolation, the hospital on Tuesday said no emergency cardiothoracic vascular surgery case was refused.

A 32-year-old woman had undergone a heart transplant at the Ram Manohar Lohia (RML) Hospital on August 22, which the hospital had claimed was the first successful heart transplant surgery at a central government-run hospital in New Delhi.

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In a tweet, the RML Hospital said as soon as the patient was shifted out of the intensive care unit (ICU), the routine elective cases were started with full throttle, without any delay.

"No emergency CTVS case was refused and the hospital has sufficient OT, staff and infrastructure for emergency cases," it said.

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According to sources, the patient was kept on a ventilator and inotropes in the ICU. She was required to be kept in isolation because of immunosuppression and the risk of transmission of infection from other patients.

Reportedly, due to a lack of facilities, the surgeries of the other heart patients were halted for 10 days.

"These type of cases are very challenging and the chances of superinfection specially in immunosuppressive state and that too in ICU set up is very high," the hospital said in a series of tweets.

Apart from that an endomyocardial biopsy (as a part of the post-operative protocol to look for the viability of myocardium) was also done," it said in one of the tweets.

"RML hospital is proud to say that we had a successful heart transplant done on 21 August which continued through 22 August morning. Post operatively patient was on medicines for BP support and ventilator. These type of cases are very challenging," it added.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)