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A second life
With a new heart.
A MAN with a new heart and a pair of new lungs is living out a second lease of life at Sundakkamuthur Village near Kovaipudur, owing to the generosity of a number of anonymous donors.
Balamurugan Williams, who's now in his early thirties, suffered from a congenital heart disease, "ventricular septal defect with Eisenmenger's syndrome'', and needed both organs to be transplanted, if he was to continue to live.
With Balamurugan's father having died, his widowed mother who works as a cleaner at a bank, went relentlessly from donor to donor, seeking help to save her son's life.
``She's a remarkable woman who did the impossible for her son. I admire her, for she symbolises every mother in the country,'' says Colonel (Retd) A. Sridharan, who has coordinated some of the efforts to mobilise funds for Balamurugan's anguished mother.
It took her more than a year to collect Rs. 5 lakhs for the medical expenses. However, Balamurugan's health condition deteriorated, and Dr. K. M. Cherian operated on him at the Madras Medical Mission in Chennai, and transplanted the heart and lungs from a brain-dead patient.
It took Balamurugan four months to recover, all the while in hospital, but he's now back home at Sundakkamuthur. Madras Medical Mission waived the major portion of the hospital and operation charges, which worked out to over Rs. 10 lakhs.
Though back at home, and settled amidst familiar surroundings, the man who's come through it all now needs help to buy the medicines he needs to keep him going. At today's rates, the monthly costs are around Rs. 11,000. It could go down as he recovers fully and regains health.
Colonel Sridharan, who is also the moderator of "Coimbatore eGroup'', says that the online network has already found a donor in the United States, who's ready to pay Balamurugan's medical bills for six months, at the rate of Rs. 5500 every month.
They're also trying to find a registered organisation with a "Trust'' account, to receive donations. This organisation could help coordinate the efforts being made to help Balamurugan. In addition, they've appealed to hospital and pharmaceutical companies to do their bit to help the patient.
Interested in doing something to bring cheer to the man who's living again with a borrowed heart and lungs? Ring: Colonel (Retd) A. Sridharan on 216867. E-mail: "covaiprop@vsnl.net'' or "chitrasri@vsnl.com''
Incidentally, the three-year-old "Coimbatore eGroup'' is an electronic network of Coimbatoreans living all over the world. It's a group that's come together on the Internet, because of their "concern and links with Coimbatore''.
They are at: "http://groups.yahoo.com/group/coimbatore'' and the nice thing is that user identities are a secret, and you know most of the other members only through their e-mail ID's.
By A. A. Michael Raj
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Life
Bangalore
Chennai
Coimbatore
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Thiruvananthapuram
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