For the first time in Nepal, a Workshop on Deceased Donation for ICU& Transplant Coordinators was organised by MOHAN Foundation and Nepal Transplantation Society (NTS) on 25th & 26th April 2018 at Hotel Radisson in Kathmandu. Over 75 ICU doctors and nurses attended the workshop. This was a pre-conference workshop of the 1^st International Conference of NTS and 11th Nephrology, Urology & Transplantation Conference of SAARC. Nepal has recognised brain death as a form of death and is ready to embark on deceased organ donation and transplantation. This workshop will go a long way in promoting deceased donation as all the key stakeholders participated in the programme. The Prime Minister of Nepal, Mr. K. P. Oli, too is keen to promote this form of donation.

Dr. Bhola Raj Joshi, President NTS in his welcome address said that the workshop would help ICU staff understand how to improve the donor pool. Dr. Dibya Singh Shah in her ‘Overview of transplantation in Nepal’ said that the first successful living related kidney transplant was performed at Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital in August 2008. In 2017, 300 kidney transplants were performed in the country. At present, there are 3000 patients on dialysis. Dr. Subhash Acharya outlined the Human Body Organ Transplant Act, 1998, the Kidney Transplant regulations of 2002, and the amendments in 2016 (brain death, provision for paired exchange, wide expansion of list of immediate relatives for live donation). He explained that all guidelines have been given regarding certification of brain death. The other faculty from Nepal were Dr. Gentle Sunder Shrestha, Dr. Pramesh Shrestha, and Dr. Gopal Kumar Chaudhary who gave their valuable inputs on the medical and medicolegal aspects of deceased organ donation.

The faculty from India included Dr. Kapil Zirpe, Head of the Department of Neuro critical Care, Ruby Hall Clinic, Grant Medical Foundation, Pune, India and the current President of the Indian Society of Critical Care Medicine (ISCCM), Dr. Subhal Dixit, Director, Critical Care, Sanjeevan and MJM Hospital, Pune and President-elect of ISCCM, and Dr. Avnish Seth, Director, Gastroenterology &Hepatobiliary Sciences and Director, Fortis Organ Retrieval and Transplant, FMRI, Gurgaon.

The faculty from MOHAN Foundation included Dr. Sunil Shroff, Managing Trustee, Dr. Sumana Navin, Course Director, Ms. Pallavi Kumar, Executive Director Delhi NCR and Ms. Sujatha Suriyamoorthi, MIS and Programme Manager. The whole team shared the learnings and continuing challenges in India as well as possible take aways for Nepal.

The panel discussion on ‘How to create an organ sharing registry and give momentum to the deceased donation programme in Nepal’ was moderated by Dr. Sunil Shroff. The panellists were Dr. Pawan Chalise, Dr. Prabin Adhikary, Dr. Diptesh Aryal, Dr. Amit Sharma Bhattarai, Journalists Kalpana Acharya and Bhagvati Timal Sinha, Raj Kumar silwal – DSP, CIB, Bimal Basnet - SP, Police HQ Kathmandu, and Dr. Avnish Seth. At the end of the discussion, the panellists shared their thoughts on what they felt were the key areas: Dr. Pawan Chalise–clarify legal framework to facilitate deceased donation, Dr. Prabin Adhikary – all stake holders need to be on board, formulate a committee for organ donation, Dr. Diptesh Aryal–identify champion nurses and train them, Dr. Amit Sharma Bhattarai – consider having opt-out system, Kalpana Acharya – media plays a major role and can be a bridge to reach ordinary people, Bhagvati Timal Sinha – media will support he cause and the police should observe the process minutely, Raj Kumar Silwal – educate people and start the deceased donation discourse in Nepal, Bimal Basnet – donation is very important in Hinduism, campaign for awareness first within the family, then society and country, Dr. Avnish Seth – focus needs to be on converting potential donors to actual deceased donors.