Hyderabad:To strengthenorgan transplantservices acrossTelangana, Health Minister C. Damodar Raja Narasimha convened a meeting with senior Health Department officials on Wednesday and issued key directives aimed at expanding and improving transplantation facilities in government hospitals across the State. During the review meeting, the Minister assessed the functioning of the State-run Jeevandan organ transplant programme. Currently, major transplants are conducted at Nizam’s Institute of Medical Sciences (NIMS), Gandhi Hospital, and Osmania General Hospital in Hyderabad. The Minister directed that organ transplantation surgeries also be conducted at MGM Hospital in Warangal and RIMS in Adilabad. Read: Karnataka Plans Organ Transplant Centres in 22 Medical Colleges To further bolster the organ transplant infrastructure, the Minister directed health officials to prepare detailed proposals for setting up Organ Retrieval Centres in all district headquarters. Officials also briefed the Minister on the recently adopted Central legislation on organ donation, which has widened the pool of eligible donors. The law now permits grandparents to both donate and receive organs. The Minister highlighted the importance of operationalising organ swapping. In this process, if a donor in one family is medically incompatible with the intended recipient, and a donor in another family faces a similar situation, both families may exchange donors to ensure that each patient receives a compatible organ, reports theHindu. Also Read:ESIC Hospital Hyderabad perform first in-house cadaver organ retrieval, Gives new life to three had previously reported that over 18,900 organ transplants were performed in 2024 in India - the highest in a single year, said Union Health Minister JP Nadda. He was speaking at the 15th Indian Organ Donation Day organised by the National Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation (NOTTO) under the aegis of the Directorate General of Health Services, Ministry of Health, at Dr Ambedkar International Centre. Nadda stated that the government is continuously streamlining organ donation and transplant so that more and more citizens can benefit from it.