Times of India
25 March 2011
Lucknow, India

Medical Wonder
Five–year–old Ajay got a new lease of life after 18 months of treatment at the Balrampur Hospital. The boy was discharged by doctors on Thursday. Ajay was suffering from aplastic anaemia, a rare blood disease that affects 14 persons in a population of one million every year in Asia.

Talking to reporters on the occasion, senior consultant in the paediatric department, Dr GK Singh said, "It’s a great day for us too. The child has been keeping healthy without medicines for last one year (since March 2010) and now we can say that he is cured. Even the chance of a relapse is not there."

Dr GK Singh added that though medication was stopped, the boy was kept to check if a relapse happens. To note, chances of relapse are high in such diseases. Fortunately, the child is healthy and can now lead a normal life. "There is no need for coming to us now, unless there is a problem," medical superintendent Dr Ashutosh Kumar Dubey told the child.

Ajay’s father, AK Verma is a farmer and felt satisfied taking his son back home. "I am thankful to God and these doctors," said the father. Treatment for aplastic anaemia is available at Chhatrapati Shahuji Maharaj Medical University (CSMMU) and Sanjay Gandhi Post Graduate Institute Of Medical Sciences (SGPGIMS).

But, the poor farmer had little money to bear the cost. So he brought his son to Balrampur Hospital in October 2009. Initially, the doctors asked Verma to take his son to SGPGIMS or CSMMU. But, he kept urging them and eventually, the doctors started Ajay’s treatment.