PETALING JAYA: Siti Salmah Jasni's long wait for new lungs is
over. And she will be getting a new heart too, because the lung
disease has affected her heart.
Siti Salmah, 18, will be getting both her organs from the same
donor – a 24-year-old woman from Alor Star who died after being hit
by a motorcycle.
This would make Siti Salmah the first person in Malaysia to
receive both lungs and heart simultaneously.
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Retrieval team: IJN medical personnel arriving at the Sultanah Bahiyah Hospital in Alor Star to obtain organs from the young woman donor late yesterday. |
Siti Salmah, who suffers
from pulmonary hypertension and has been registered as an organ
recipient since 2005, was wheeled into the operating theatre at the
National Heart Institute (IJN) at about 10pm to begin the procedure
after her donor was found.
The 19-member medical team, including Dr Mohamad Ezani Md Talib,
Dr Suhaini Kadiman and Dr Ashaari Yunus, was flown by a Royal
Malaysian Air Force (RMAF) mercy flight to Sultanah Bahiyah Hospital
in Alor Star to obtain the organs from the donor.
The transplant was scheduled to be carried out early this
morning.
The donor, a clerk at a lawyer's office, was hit by a motorcycle
while crossing the road on her way to work on Tuesday morning.
Sultanah Bahiyah Hospital director Dr Che Pah Ahmad confirmed
that she was declared brain dead yesterday.
The donor’s mother, who declined to be named, said her daughter
had told her that she wanted to have her vital organs donated when
she died so that she could help others.
“But I never thought she would die so soon after making such a
pledge,” she said.
The flight to retrieve the organs from the donor in Alor Star was
one of two mercy flights by the RMAF yesterday.
The other flight involved bringing seven-year-old Muhammad Haziq
Noorby from the Universiti Sains Malaysia Hospital in Kubang Kerian
near Kota Baru to Gleneagles Intan Medical Centre in Kuala
Lumpur.
He was suffering from a congenital heart disease and needed
immediate surgery.
RMAF public relations officer Mejar Zulkiflee Abdul Latiff said
the C-130 aircraft took off from the Subang airbase, headed to Kota
Baru where Muhammad Haziq was picked up and then went to Alor Star
where the IJN team was dropped off before returning to Subang.
Later, the aircraft returned to Alor Star to pick the IJN team up
and brought them and the organs back to Kuala Lumpur.
This article was originally published in theStar Online.
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