A team of doctors at Bhagwan Mahavir Medica Superspeciality Hospital in Ranchi are keeping their fingers crossed for the recovery of a hexagenerian patient.

The recovery of this 65-year old patient from Daltonganj will prove the success of plasma therapy applied for the first time in the state on a critically ill Covid-19 patient.

“He was in a bad shape and put on a ventilator when plasma was administered to him on Tuesday evening,” Dr Vijay Kumar Mishra, critical care specialist of Medica Hospital treating the patient informed, reminding that plasma therapy is applied on critical Covid patients only.

“He continues to be critical and still on ventilator but we are noticing some indications of improvement,” the doctor said when asked about the patient’s condition on Thursday.

“Actually, the improvement is expected between 48 and 72 hours after administering plasma,” Dr Mishra said, adding there was still time left for that as the therapy was done on Tuesday evening.

The patient had fever accompanied by breathing trouble when he first came to the Medica Hospital, as the facility is commonly known, the doctor informed, adding “he also had some cardiac issues”.

“When we found his problem was not related to any cardiac issues, he was advised to go for Covid test the result of which came positive,” Dr Mishra informed on Thursday afternoon. His condition started deteriorating and he was diagnosed to be suffering from Covid pneumonia, he added.

“We tried all known medicines and thought of considering plasma therapy as the last resort,” he further said, adding they could not do anything at that stage as plasma of any recovered Covid patient was not available in Ranchi that time.

Chief minister Hemant Soren formally opened plasma banking system at the local Rajendra Institute of medical Sciences (RIMS) on July 28 that facilitated plasma therapy.

Deepu Kumar Singh, a choreographer and fitness trainer of Kokar locality in Ranchi and working in Mumbai who had recovered from Covid last month was the first donor of plasma.

“When we learnt about it, we approached RIMS for plasma the same day and the patient was administered the same in the evening,” Dr Mishra informed.

The plasma taken out from a Covid recovered patient carries antibodies which, when injected into the body of a critical patient, help the patient to recover by fighting coronavirus and winning over it.

“Let’s hope for the best,” Dr Mishra said when asked about the chances of the plasma recipient’s recovery.