Criticising a city hospital for offering free intestinal transplant to the Delhi gang-rape victim, a leading cardiologist, who had monitored her treatment, Friday said the statement was "irresponsible" as the woman had to be stabilised first.
"There were a lot of statements at that time related to her intestinal transplant... they were irresponsible statements," Naresh Trehan, chairman of Medanta Hospital, told reporters here.
"At that time the issue was not intestinal transplant... she had to be stabilised first," he added.
A section of gangrenous intestine of the 23-year-old paramedical studennt was removed at the Safdarjung Hospital where she was admitted December 16 following a brutal gang-rape and torture in a moving bus.
The privately-run Sir Ganga Ram Hospital in central Delhi had offered the intestine transplant on December 21 and was willing to bear the cost of all subsequent treatment as well.
The hospital then said that intestinal transplant was the only course of treatment that would have offered the victim a chance of functional intestines and survival.
Trehan, though, said that the journey from the removal of intestines to their transplant is a long one.
"It takes years to stabilise a patient whose intestines have been removed. We have to constantly check for infections and only then can we think about a transplant," said Trehan.
"She was not needing a transplant at that time and that's why we were not making any claims," he added.
The young woman was shifted to Singapore's' Mount Elizabeth Hospital on December 26 and died on December 29 after a 13-day fight for life.
