Patna: He breathed his last on Monday but 90-year-old Lalit Mohan Sahay gifted two people vision.

Sahay, a retired accounts examiner of Central Board of Excise and Customs, who died after chronic pulmonary problem at his residence at Bypass in Patna, had expressed the desire to donate his eyes on his deathbed before his family members.

His family contacted Indira Gandhi Institute of Medical Sciences (IGIMS) for the eye donation soon after his death. Digha MLA Sanjeev Chourasia, who is known to the family members of Sahay, co-ordinated the cornea donation procedure.

Nilesh Mohan, a doctor with the ophthalmology department of IGIMS, confirmed that Sahay happened to be the oldest donor so far in Patna.

He said one the corneas harvested from Sahay had already been transplanted to a 35-year-old woman in Gaya who was suffering from corneal ulcer, while the other would be used for restoring the vision of another patient on Wednesday.

"We have dialled two to three patients. The one who reaches the hospital first would undergo the corneal transplant surgery. Whenever we get a fresh cornea, we call at least two to three patients' families so that in case any one patient doesn't turn up, the cornea can be used for some other patient and does not go waste. While the process of cornea harvesting has to be completed within six hours of death of the person, the extracted cornea can be preserved for 96 hours," Mohan said.

On whether an aged person's cornea can be used in restoring the vision of someone else he said: "The quality of corneal tissue among the aged is not as good as a young donor. So cornea received from an aged donor is mainly used in therapeutic keratoplasty of a patient suffering from corneal ulcer. The non-healing corneal ulcers, which is not responding to the treatment, require a transplant surgery just to save the eye. In the later stage, optimal keratoplasty, a thermal laser technique to restore vision, is done on the patient," added Nilesh.#

In case of corneal ulcer, the eyes don't respond to any of the drugs, so the cornea of such patients usually starts melting. This is a medical emergency when thera-peutic keratoplasty is required to save eyes structurally and this can be done while using the cornea of an aged person too if the cornea is in good condition, said the doctor.

Sahay's son Sanjay Kumar said: "My father was very social. He always used to help pensioners whenever they faced problems in drawing pensions. When he expressed his desire of donating his eyes we were not quite surprised. We respect his decision and so we followed his last wish. The family is happy with his decision."