Milestone in Liver Transplantation: Surgeons trained at Sir Ganga Ram Hospital conduct over 50 percent of country's liver transplants

New Delhi: Speaking on this special occasion Dr D S Rana Chairman, Sir Ganga Ram Trust Society mentioned the remarkable feat of medical expertise and said, ''We are very proud to have the Gyan Burman Liver Unit as an integral part of the hospital. 

It has done sterling work in training young surgeons, publishing books and papers on liver diseases and how to do research and has helped establish liver transplantation in India. In fact, it is estimated that more than 50% of the liver transplants in this country are performed by surgeons who have worked in Sir Ganga Ram Hospital.”

The Gyan Burman Liver Unit which was started in 2002 in Sir Ganga Ram Hospital by his family to honor the memory of Mr Gyan Burman one of the key persons involved in developing the Dabur industrial empire.  

Mr Pradip Burman, the younger brother of Mr Gyan Burman who is an environmentalist and a crusader for sustainability and Gyan’s family has funded the Unit. This fund has supported the publication of more than 100 articles, Annual Audit books of our Department, a Residents' Manual, a 'Liver Transplant Handbook for Patients' and an open access book ‘How to Practice Academic Medicine and Publish from Developing Countries’ which has had 1.6 million downloads to date. It has helped surgical trainees to attend conferences in this country and abroad including one at the Johns Hopkins Hospital in the USA.

The Gyan Burman Liver Fund has played a major role in initiating the liver transplant programme in India. It first convened a national meeting in 2003 where 50 surgeons from all over the country discussed why our results at that time were poor and how we should move forward (the proceedings are included in the book ‘Liver Transplantation and Cadaveric Organ Donation published in 2003).


There are now 184 liver transplant centers in this country where in 2022, 3500 transplants were done which were the third largest number in the world and the largest number of Living Donor Liver Transplants. Since its inception, 145 Gyan Burman fellows have been trained from 15 countries - Kenya, Mexico, Fiji, Turkmenistan, Sudan, Zimbabwe, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Mauritius, Bangladesh, Nepal, Saudi Arabia, the USA, Greece, Pakistan as well as from India.

Dr Ajay Swaroop, Chairman Board of Management, Sir Ganga Ram Hospital also mentioned “Sir Ganga Ram Hospital is constantly involved in improving learning at various levels and promoting cutting edge medical technology for looking after all strata of society. The Gyan Burman Foundation is associated with us to promote scientific work on Liver diseases and liver transplantation.

The 9th Gyan Burman Oration this year will be presented by Nobel Laureate Prof. Abhijit Banerjee on May 29th, 2024, at 7:00 pm at the India International Centre in New Delhi. His speech topic, "Markets for Healthcare," explores the economic systems and processes involved in the purchase, sale, and distribution of healthcare products and services. This encompasses a broad spectrum of transactions and engagements among healthcare providers, patients, insurers, governments, pharmaceutical firms, medical equipment suppliers, and various other parties involved in healthcare.

The annual oration is a very prestigious event. And has been delivered by Prof Henri Bismuth from France, Dr Yuman Fong from the USA, Dr. Abhinav Humar from the USA, Prof S. T. Fan from Hong Kong, Sir Roy Calne from the UK, Prof Pierre A Clavien from Switzerland, Prof Dirk J Gouma from Amsterdam and Patrick Kamath from the Mayo Clinic, USA.