Oninternational women’s day, data shows that women outnumber their male counterparts when it comes to live kidney donation in city hospitals. Though a small number of kidneys come via cadaver donation under the state-run Jeevandan programme, a high 75-80% of live kidney donors in Hyderabad are women, both in government and private hospitals, reveal findings.
Case in point: The 15-year kidney transplantation records of Nims hospital. Out of the total 415 live kidney transplants performed at the institute between 2000 and 2015, as many as 313 were women donors. This translates into 75.42% of the total figure.
Not surprisingly, the count of women ‘gifting’ their kidneys to male members of the family is led by mothers (158 cases), followed by spouses (in 109 cases), sisters (44 cases) and daughters (2 cases).
“This is a trend seen across the country, including Hyderabad. While women, in general, comprise 80% of all live kidney donors, men account for 80% of kidney recipients,” said Dr D Sree Bhushan Raju, head, nephrology department, Nims hospital.
Among them is 47-year-old Neeraja Nirupa, a Banjara Hills resident, who volunteered to part with one of her kidneys when her 17-year-old son Raymond Milind was detected with a liver failure only recently. “Raymond is our only son and it was my wife who stepped up and decided to donate her kidney when the call came for a live donor. I could not volunteer as I am a diabetic,” said Rajasekhar Jacob, husband of Neeraja, who is employed with the Andhra Pradesh government.
But Neeraja clearly isn’t the only one as statistics across corporate hospitals put women ahead of men on this donors list. While in Care Hospitals 74% of donors are women (as per 11 out of 15 recent live kidney donor cases), in Continental the percentage is a neat 100 -all the 4 live kidney transplants that took place in recent times involved women donors. The scenario at the state-run Osmania General Hospital isn’t any different. Since it started dealing in kidney transplantation cases in 1980s, OGH doctors have performed over 500 renal transplant involving live donors. Of this, 75-80% donors have been women, hospital records show.