Plasma therapy shows positive result on critical patient

New Delhi: The Max Hospital in Saket has administered plasma therapy on a critical coronavirus patient and it’s showing positive results with the patient being taken off ventilator support, the hospital said on Monday.
The 49-year-old man became the first patient to be administered plasma therapy at the Max Hospital (East Wing) here, the hospital said in a statement. “His condition deteriorated during the next few days and he soon required external oxygen to maintain saturation. He also developed pneumonia with Type-I respiratory failure and had to be put on ventilator support on April 8,” the hospital said.
When the patient showed no improvement, his family members requested the hospital to administer plasma therapy on compassionate grounds, a first of its kind treatment modality that is being used for the disease in India.
“The family came forward to arrange a donor for extracting plasma. The donor had recovered from the infection (confirmed by two consecutive negative reports) three weeks ago and again tested Covid-19 negative at the time of donation along with other standard tests to rule out infections like Hep B, Hep C and HIV,” the hospital said.
“After receiving the treatment, the patient showed improvement and by the fourth day, he was weaned off ventilator support and continued on supplementary oxygen thereafter,” it added. (IANS)