Regulatory aspects of tissue donation, banking and transplantation in India

Amendments to India's Transplantation of Human Organs Act, 1994, have established the legality of tissue donation and transplantation from deceased donors and the conditions under which they are permitted. The amended Act, now known as The Transplantation of Human Organs and Tissues Act, 1994, seeks to prevent the commercialization of tissue donation and to guarantee the safety of indigenous allografts. Registration of tissue banks, compliance with national standards and the appointment of transplant co-ordinators in hospitals registered under the Act are now mandatory. A national registry and Regional and State networks for donation and transplantation of tissues have been introduced. Despite the amendments a few anomalies of the principal Act persist as some of the differences between tissue and organ donation and transplantation have been overlooked. These include the possibility of skin donation in locations other than hospitals; the donation of medical and surgical tissue residues which does not pose any risk to the living donor; the non-requirement for compatibility between donor and recipient; the delayed time factor between tissue donation and transplantation which makes identification of a recipient at the time of donation impossible; and the easy availability of alternatives to tissues which make waiting lists redundant for many tissues. Rules for the implementation of the amended Act were framed in 2014 but like the Act must be adopted by the State health assemblies to become universally applicable in the country.