ITN Vol 13; Issue 40, 2013-2014

Indian-origin doctor working on new organ preservation solution

Dr. Hemant Thatte, a senior cardiovascular surgeon at Harvard University, who was born in Mumbai and raised in Pune, has worked out a 21-chemical solution called SOMAH that could preserve a donated organ for up to a week before a transplant.

“… In October 2009, Dr. Thatte had published a paper in the medical journal Circulation, comparing SOMAH to a widely-used preservation solution to show how the rate of cell death was lower in the former. This research suggested hearts kept in SOMAH could be stored for up to a week as against other solutions that allow for only four hours...”