Heart Airlifted from Bangaluru to Chennai by scheduled Indigo flight

Ms Sunitha Bai was admitted in MS Ramaiah Memorial Hospital, Bangalore, where she was diagnosed with Cerebral Vascular Thrombosis. The anomaly rendered her brain-damaged and with no scope for recovery. Ms Sunitha’s family came forward to donate her organs for transplantation so that others may benefit and live.

Mr Sathish, from Fortis Malar received the information on the availability of a donor for heart at 3:30pm on 20th Dec’15, Sunday. He immediately started thinking about how the heart could be transported from Bengaluru to Chennai and planning for the surgery on a patient who was on the waiting-list. What should have been a regular process at Fortis Malar, hit a road-block when the chartered airplane provider, informed the hospital of the unavailability of an aircraft. However, the donor’s family wanted the formalities to be over much earlier so the operation could begin.

Dr Murali from Fortis Malar was rushed to Bengaluru to assess the donor’s heart. The reports were in the affirmative. The next available commercial passenger flight to Chennai was Indigo, which was scheduled to depart from Bangalore airport @ 6:25 am. A ticket for Dr Murali was organized on this flight. The transplant team immediately contacted the top management of Indigo, who went out of their way to play their part in saving a human life. Dr Murali reached the airport, with the harvested heart, with less than 40 minutes to departure. The regular check-in and security screening formalities were relaxed and Dr Murali was rushed to the aircraft in record time. He was given the first seat next to the exit door and the flight departed earlier than scheduled.

At the Chennai airport, the flight landed at 7:10 am. The staff at Indigo Airlines whisked Dr Murali and the harvested organ out of the airport in less than 5 minutes, from where the waiting Fortis Malar ambulance took less than 15 minutes to reach the hospital.

The heart has been transplanted by Dr K R Balakrishnan and his team and the patient is stable now and recovering.

Fortis Malar thanks the staff at Indigo Airlines Ms Avisha, Mr Madan, Mr Yasif and also Mr Sundar of Airports Authority of India for helping to make this happen.

Awareness and their desire to help saved the day and importantly a valuable human life!