Raj Vir Singh Yadav

• Professor Raj Vir Singh Yadav
  Professor Raj Vir Singh Yadav

Professor Raj Vir Singh Yadav (born 27 July 1937 in village Nauliharnathpur of district Budaun, Uttar Pradesh, India) was a surgeon who was a pioneer in kidney transplantation and served the Indian medical fraternity for over 45 years.

Commonly known as Dr RVS Yadav, he has been honoured by the establishment of the Raj Vir Singh Yadav Foundation, which aims to intervene in the propagation and conduct of medical-cum-scientific education, awareness, research and practice. It also further seeks to intervene in activities pertaining to the socio-economic assistance, development and general welfare-cum-empowerment of the rural sector.

Biography and Citation

Professor Raj Vir Singh Yadav was awarded the MBBS in 1961 and the MS (Surgery) in 1964 respectively from the King George’s Medical College, Lucknow University, Lucknow (KGMC). He received the FICS (General Surgery) in 1974 from the International College of Surgeons and the FACS (General Surgery) in 1977 from the American College of Surgeons.

Subsequent to his graduation, he worked with premiere teaching institutions of the country including the KGMC, AIIMS, BJMC and the PGIMER. He spent over three and a half years at the Royal Melbourne Hospital, Melbourne University and the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Adelaide, Australia for receiving exclusive training in kidney transplantation and dialysis. He received the opportunity to learn the art and science of transplant surgery from several world class experts in the field during the course of his stay in Australia. His involvement in the specialty of kidney transplantation hails back to 1967 when he served as co-investigator to an ICMR Scheme on kidney preservation and kidney transplantation in dogs. Since then he had been continuously involved with and worked for the progress of the specialty along with the practice of general surgery.

At the time of his demise, he was the senior most transplant surgeon in India. On his return from Australia he did the first hemo-dialysis at Ahmedabad. In 1973 he performed the first human kidney transplantation at the PGIMER and laid the foundation of the first transplant unit of the region. The unit he established continues to impart training to surgical and medical students at the postgraduate level besides nursing and para medical staff. Dr. Yadav trained over 25 young surgeons in the field of transplantation besides numerous nephrologists and nursing teams. In recognition of the services of Dr. Raj Yadav, the Government of India sanctioned the first of its kind center for transplantation at the PGIMER where research training and service was sought to be provided under one roof. The center is operational.

Dr. Raj Yadav has over a thousand clinical and experimental kidney transplants to his credit and several hundred allied surgical procedures. His patient population hailed from U.P, Delhi, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Bihar, Tamil Nadu, Chandigarh, Haryana, Punjab, Jammu and Kashmir and overseas. A number of his patients till date after successful kidney transplantation are in their first to twentieth years and well rehabilitated.

This surgery, which is very complicated, major and delicate requires long hours and prolonged and meticulous work on and off the operation table. Dr. Raj Yadav assisted several centers at Bombay, Hyderabad, Jaipur and Bangalore in launching the transplant surgery program. He visited several institutes demonstrating surgical techniques and delivering lectures on the subject for the benefit of professional colleagues. His patients hailed from all walks of life including farmers, laborers, teachers, housewives, students engineers, doctors, clerks and executives. He was a dedicated research worker. He had established a very active experimental transplant laboratory where three to four research workers were actively involved in a number of projects. His main research activities have been:

Experimental Kidney Transplantation and Kidney Preservation:

With an aim to establish a kidney bank, he developed a simple and inexpensive perfusion solution with which kidneys can be safely preserved for 24 hours outside body before transplant. This will go a long way in kidney exchange program once India has a network of centers and the cadaver kidney donation becomes popular. Effect of ischaemania on kidney, protection against these ill effects and better and more prolonged preservation techniques were investigated on dogs as a part of this activity.

Ovarian and Uterotubovarian Complex Transplantation:

To restore fertility in barren female dogs, isolated ovarian transplant for hormonal substitution without vascular anastomosis was successfully achieved in smaller animals. The attempt thereafter was to replace the entire internal genital tract of female dogs – a situation more akin to clinical problems of gross destruction of reproductive system by disease. In fifty percent of sterile couples, the cause lies with the woman. Such women unfortunately carry a social stigma of being barren and some of them even end their lives. There are also a number of couples who after female sterilization operation lose their only child. Both these categories need to be helped as this is an equally important aspect success. Dr. Raj Yadav’s research carried great hope for these women and was a unique breakthrough in the field of transplant surgery. He and his team remained engaged in this work for over three years and results achieved were quite encouraging. His research efforts were hailed and got accepted for presentation before the national body of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and International College of Surgeons.

Experimental Pancreatic Transplantation:

To reverse diabetes is another pioneering work; Dr. Raj Yadav had taken up. Two percent of the population of our country suffers from diabetes. A large number is dependent on insulin injections twice or thrice a day which makes life miserable. Moreover insulin treatment does not eliminate the dreadful complications of diabetes, it merely prolongs life.

Dr. Raj Yadav was member of various prestigious professional societies such as the International Transplantation Society, the British Transplantation Society, the Australian Nephrology Society, Indian Nephrology Society, Association of Surgeon of India and the International College of Surgeons. He was an ICMR expert on Organ Transplantation and was on the expert panel of the Institute of Medical Sciences at Srinagar and the Sanjay Gandhi Postgraduate Institute of Medical Sciences at Lucknow.

Dr. Raj Yadav was examiner in surgery and nephrology for postgraduate degrees. He had acted as expert for the Public Service Commission. He was invited as visiting fellow to the Christchurch Hospital in New Zealand and visiting professor to several Indian universities. He lectured at universities in Australia, the United States and the United Kingdom regarding the progress of transplant surgery in India. He was appointed honorary associate to the University of Melbourne Hospital. He was visitor to numerous transplant centers in the United States, the United Kingdom, Asia and Australia.

Dr. Raj Yadav was invited for demonstrating kidney transplantation surgery in Pakistan. He could also attract number of luminaries and visiting professors to the PGIMER in the field of transplantation from the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia. He introduced the Organ Donor Card and popularized the Cadaver Kidney Donor Program in India for the first time in 1976. He organized a very successful sports meet for kidney donors and recipients for the first time in the country in the year of the disabled which proved to be great forum for publicity of this noble cause and a moral booster to the patients and donors and an eye opener and education to lay public. Since then it has become a regular biennial affair. He also held for the first time transplant convention in 1983 where eminent people from religious organizations, bureaucracy, legal professional patients and donors and the general public freely discussed various issues related to organ transplantation. Dr. Raj Yadav had taken up the issue of legalizing cadaver donation with the Governments of India and Punjab.

In recognition of his dedication and achievements, he was awarded the Padma Shree in 1982. His selfless, persistent and untiring service towards the ailing humanity and his concern for enhancing national honors and progress of specialty of organ transplantation in our country remain unmatched.

Dr. Raj Vir Singh Yadav’s last held positions were Senior Consultant in Transplant Surgery at the Indraprastha Apollo Hospitals, New Delhi (Apollo Hospital) and Chairman, Department of Transplantation Surgery, Nephrology & Urology at the Metro Hospitals, Noida, UP (Metro Hospital).

External links

• RVSY Foundation