Jaipur: SMS Hospital has established a department for treatment of blood-related cancers and other blood disorders. The department will offer advanced Car-T cell therapy to cancer patients. This innovative therapy has so far been administered to only a few patients in the state by private hospitals. SMS Hospital will be the first govt hospital to have established a separate department for clinical haematology (DCH).Car-T cell therapy is the country’s first indigenous gene therapy, also known as Chimeric Antigen Receptor T-Cell Therapy. It is a form of treatment based on genetic modifications and was developed in India at just a tenth of the cost compared to its price abroad.“We have all the resources available at our DCH for performing Car-T. It is an advanced therapy for treatment of cancer patients,” said Dr Vishnu Sharma, head of the DCH department. He added that the department will provide treatment for all kinds of haematological cancers, and disorders from bleeding disorders to bone marrow transplant.The department has 20 beds for patients. “The department has been established at SMS Hospital, but it will be shifted to the state cancer institute later,” Dr Sharma said. Till now, only private hospitals in Rajasthan performed Car-T cell therapy. An 82-year-old woman from Jaipur holds the distinction of being the eldest recipient of Car-T cell therapy in the country. “The woman suffered from high-grade lymphoma, a cancer of lymph nodes. She was not responding to chemotherapy and other conventional treatments, due to which her lymphoma relapsed. We collected her T-cells and sent them to Mumbai to the company that manufactures Car-T cells. The patient also reached Mumbai, where she was infused with the Car-T cell almost a year ago,” said Dr Hemant Malhotra, director of oncology services at Mahatma Gandhi Hospital. Bhagwan Mahaveer Cancer Hospital also performed Car-T cell therapy in Dec last year.
