India can be a place where all your dreams may come true or the place where you will be lost. Seems like the former worked for the 30-year old Afghan soldier from Kandahar who lost both his hands while defusing mines in the war-torn country.
The soldier Abdul Rahim lost his both hands three years back when he was defusing a bomb in Kandahar. So, when India started offering hands transplant operation, Abdul asked for the service 4-months back and with 20 surgeons and eight anesthetics , carrying out a marathon surgical procedure lasting for almost 15 hours, Abdul Rahim became the first Afghan to be successfully transplanted with two Indian hands. The donor of the hands is a 54-year-old brain-dead accident victim from Kerala.
“Rahim has regained considerable amount of function of both his hands using them for day-to-day activities. He will need intensive physiotherapy for another 9 to 10 months, for which he will have to stay back in Kochi. Each hand required connecting two bones, two arteries, four veins and about 14 tendons. The immune suppressant drugs were started before the start of the surgery and continued after it.” said Subramania Iyer, Professor and Head of the Plastic Surgery department.
The first of such kind transplant happened 4 month ago in a Kochi based hospital and the recipient, 30-year-old Manu is doing extremely well and is able to do every chores and activities.
Truly, such operation and advancement in science and medicine is a bliss and can prove to be a blessing for many.