The Gyan Burman Liver Unit

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The Gyan Burman Liver unit(GBLU) was started in 2003 to perpetuate the memory of my brother late “Gyan Burman”. The unit was stared after consulting with  Dr. Samiran Nundy, so it serves as a corpus for training liver surgeons. The 3 months fellowship program was setup with the aims

RELEASE-OF-“THE-GYAN-BURMAN-LIVER-UNIT”-REPORT
  1. To support research into hepatobiliary diseases especially those prevalent in India
  2. To start an eponymous fellowship in hepatobiliary surgery for young surgeons from various parts of the world
  3. To promote liver transplantation in India
  4. To organise the annual Gyan Burman Oration, to be delivered by one of the world’s foremost liver surgeons.
  5. To help poor patients who cannot afford medical treatment.

In the 15 years of its existence it has supported the publication of 52 papers and 10 books related to liver disease, including ‘Liver Transplantation in India’, a ‘Residents’ Manual’ and a ‘Liver Transplant handbook for patients’. It has helped surgical trainees attend conferences in this country and abroad, including the Johns Hopkins Hospital in the USA.

The GBLU has trained, for 3 month periods, 115 Indian doctors from various all over India and International Fellows from Kenya, Bangladesh, Nepal, Saudi Arabia, USA, Greece, Nigeria, the West Indies, Myanmar, Fiji, Singapore and Pakistan. There are enquiries about the fellowship every week, recently some from Somalia, Argentina, Chile and Armenia. The fellows stay in a rented furnished apartment near the hospital.

The Gyan Burman liver unit has played a major role in initiating the liver transplant program in India. It first convened a national meeting in 2003, where 50 surgeons from all over the country discussed why their results, at that time, were poor and how they should move forward. There are now 73 liver transplant centres in this country and, in 2017, 1600 transplants were done. The Ganga Ram Hospital was one of the pioneers in the field. More than 70% of the procedures were done by surgeons who have worked, or have been trained, in this unit.

The Gyan Burman Orations have been delivered by Henri Bismuth from Paris, S.T. Fan from Hong Kong, Abhinav Humar from Pittsburgh, Yuman Fong from New York, Sir Roy Calne from Cambridge, Pierre Clavien from Zurich and Dirk Gouma from Amsterdam

Many poor patients have been helped with their medical expenses.

The creation of this innovative program has been a fitting and lasting tribute to the late Gyan Burman and has influenced the lives and work of many surgeons and patients from all over the world.

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