Monday, April 21, 2008

Thalassemia

Today I went to Indira Gandhi Children Hospital to donate blood. The blood was for Master Subramani who is 6 years old. Subramani parents are small time flower vendors. He got a very cute smile. His hands are very soft. I came to know Master Selvamani suffering from Thalassemia. I got terrified when I heard the little fellow required blood transfusion every 3 weeks.

The lab assistant Srinivas had given me few details about the decease. Srinivas had put me to Dr.Pradeep who is pathologist. Please watch the short conversion.


Thalassemia Major is a genetic, blood disorder which affects more than 1 lakh children in the country. Children suffering from this disorder cannot produce haemoglobin, which carries the oxygen, that we breathe in, to the various parts of the body. These children are born with the disorder, and will survive only if given regular blood transfusions. And, the transfusions need to be given every 15 days on an average, throughout their lives.

Repeated blood transfusions result in an undesirable build up of iron in the body, which can be fatal. The child has to take an injection everyday to dispose off the excess iron. This injection is given by a special infusion pump, over a period of 8 to 10 hrs, everyday. In most cases the injection is switched on before the child goes to sleep and detached the next morning. An oral drug has been developed for iron disposal which can replace the injection. This drug is relatively affordable. But the drug does not work with some children.

You can more information about Thalassemia at http://www.rotaractmumbaighatkopar.org/Thalassemia

The family goes through lot of pain, they have to check for the blood donor every 3 weeks. I think I should help this kid as much as possible. Towards it I found the next donor for Master Subramani. I am looking for the people from Bangalore with A+ blood group. It is only matter of finding and 6 more people and scheduling.


Do we have any technical solution to help these people?

I think yes. It is matter of connection Donor and Seekers.

  1. There will be a registration page for donors.

· Name, Email, Mobile Number, Land Line number and Blood group information will be collected.

· Last blood donation date.

  1. There will be registration page for the seekers.

· Name, Mobile number, Land Line number, Address and Blood Group will be collected. Last transfusion date will be gathered.

  1. We will assign 10 donors for each patient.
    1. Each person can give blood only once in 6 month.
  2. The system will schedule the of donors for particular patient
  3. The Auto schedule will be automatically for three weeks.
  4. The patient can update the next blood requirement date by SMS.
  5. The system will send the e-mail and SMS to next two donors.
    1. It will inform before three days, Two days On that day and two hours.
  6. Donors can send and update their availability by SMS.

I think I am pretty much done… Need to find a Ruby or PHP developer. Is there any fresher/student looking for live project please contact me.

6 comments:

Pradeep B V said...

Hey Kesava,

firstly kudos for donating blood and this post.

i can help code the things you are looking for.

- P

Shourya Sarcar said...

thanks for taking this up. we need more people like you to bridge social and tech at grassroot level.

Dilip said...

i like your concept and i want to be a part of it and i help you in coding things(ROR only)

Satish said...

hi Kesava ,
good work , i am not good at php or rails . But if i can be of any other help , do let me know . I study at VIT , Vellore .

Jon said...

I know a few who can be of some help, let me know more on web.bloggers@gmail.com
Thanx

Kesava Reddy.M said...

Hi Piyush,
Let me know the contact details.
With Regards
Kesava Reddy.M