The 18^th one week Transplant Coordinators’ Training Programme was held at the Department of Nephrology, Urology and Renal Transplant Unit, SCB Medical College & Hospital, Cuttack, Odisha from 16^th – 20^th February 2015. There were 19 participants from Delhi, Kolkata, Jaipur, Bhubaneswar and Cuttack. The training programme has been supported by the Sir Ratan Tata Trust and Navajbai Ratan Tata Trust, Mumbai since 2009.

At the inauguration, Dr. C. R. Kar, Professor and HOD, Dept. of Nephrology, SCB Medical College welcomed the Chief Guest Prof. P. C. Mohapatra, Dean, SCB Medical College, Dr. D. Hota, Professor and HOD, Dept. of Urology and Renal Transplantation, the faculty from MOHAN Foundation - Mrs. Lalitha Raghuram, Country Director, Dr. Sumana Navin, Course Director, Mr. Bulu Behera, Transplant coordinator – Mr. T. N. Panda, Founder of the NGO MOTHER (Multi Organ Transplantation, Human & Educational Research), and all the participants. Speaking on the occasion, Dr. D. Hota said that renal transplants were started in SCB Medical College & Hospital in 2012 and were being done successfully for the past three years with the support of the government. Mrs. Lalitha Raghuram said that knowledge was available with MOHAN Foundation and a road map could be created for a deceased donation programme in Odisha. Mr. T. N. Panda was of the opinion that a successful deceased donation programme needed general awareness, procedures, hospital infrastructure and facilities, and government support. The Chief Guest Prof. Mohapatra said that SCB Medical College was shortly planning to start liver transplant and corneal transplant programmes in addition to the already existing renal transplant and bone marrow transplant units. Starting a deceased donation programme would add another feather in the cap of SCB Medical College, he added.

In addition to the faculty from MOHAN Foundation, the faculty also included Dr. Rahul Pandit, Senior Consultant, Intensive Care, Fortis Hospital, Mumbai who spoke extensively about identifying and certifying brain death, the pitfalls, and maintenance of a potential brain dead donor, Dr. D. Hota (Body donation), Dr. C. R. Kar (Kidney disease and kidney transplantation), Prof. P.K. Nanda, Prof. & HOD, Regional Institute of Ophthalmology (Eye donation), Dr. Nisith Kumar Mohanty, Consultant Nephrologist, Apollo Hospitals (Immunosuppression), Dr. Mihir Kumar Mohapatra, HOD, Surgical Gastroenterology, SCB Medical College (Liver transplantation), Dr. Braja Kishore Dash, Associate Prof. Forensic Medicine, SCB Medical College (Post-mortem & medicolegal issues), and Mr. Subrat Kumar Sahoo, Transplant coordinator, Apollo Hospitals (Role of recipient coordinator). The other legal, socio-cultural, ethical aspects of organ donation and transplantation, logistics, transplant registry were covered as well as detailed sessions on counseling donor families. A number of films on various topics were also shown to reinforce concepts.

At the valedictory session, Dr. Mishra, Senior administrator, SCB Medical College & Hospital said that it was team work that paid in any endeavour and that both Dr. Hota and Dr. Kar were team players. They had made a success of the living donation renal transplant programme in a government hospital and the first step in the deceased organ donation programme had been taken with the holding of the Transplant Coordinators’ Training Programme. Dr. Mishra presented the completion certificates to the participants.