PATNA, July 26 -- Bihar government has granted permission to the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) to do liver transplantation procedure under the Transplantation of Human Organs and Tissues Act (THOTA), making it the second centre in the state to be granted the permission after Indira Gandhi Institute of Medical Sciences (IGIMS), said officials on Friday. "The AIIMS, which had reapplied for permission (in the second week of December last year), after fulfilling the deficiencies we had pointed out in the first inspection last year, was re-inspected on April 29, and granted permission on July 23 to do liver transplantation procedure," said Dr Manish Mandal, chairman of the State Organ and Tissue Transplantation Organisation (SOTTO) and also medical superintendent of IGIMS. Having got the government approval, AIIMS will now begin a liver transplant clinic to screen patients before it does the first liver transplant procedure hopefully in the coming 2-3 months, said doctors. "The departments of gastrointestinal (GI) surgery and gastroenterology will jointly hold a liver transplant clinic to screen prospective patients in the OPD (outdoor patient department) from August," said Dr Utpal Anand, additional professor and head of gastrointestinal surgery department at AIIMS, Patna. "Ideally, we would like to begin with deceased donor liver transplantation, as it is more successful than live donor transplant. In case of a live donor, we take only 50% of the liver of a healthy human, while in case of a deceased donor, the full liver is taken," said Dr Anand. AIIMS, said Dr Anand, would also undertake awareness programmes to motivate people to donate their organs besides sensitising its hospital staff....