Organ Donation the Process of

¶ … Organ Donation The process of donating organs after death is misunderstood and underutilized by many. The benefits to society as a whole are numerous. The number of people awaiting transplants has greatly outpaced the number of people donating their organs. Currently, there are over 83,000 people on the national transplant list (Snell, Levvey, & Williams, 2004). Commonly-donated organs and their uses to recipients are described below. A kidney transplant is generally more effective in treating kidney failure than many other forms of treatment, such as dialysis (Rosendale, 2003).

The ability to discontinue dialysis treatment has an enormous impact on quality of life and increases life expectancy and general health. Most kidneys used for transplants come from people who have died in a hospital intensive care unit. The liver is a commonly-donated organ. Alcohol abuse is the primary reason for liver transplant. The success rate of this procedure is ~80% (Rosendale, 2003). The small bowel can be damaged so much by severe infection or in an accident that the person can no longer absorb enough food to stay alive.

Transplantation of the small bowel is not yet widely available. Pancreatic transplantation is offered only to people with very severe diabetes and renal failure who have both a kidney and pancreas transplant at the same time. Occasionally, a diabetic may have such uncontrollable disease that transplant of a pancreas alone may be considered. Serious injury to the cornea can lead to scarring that prevents light from passing through to the retina and causes partial or complete blindness.

Cornea transplants are generally highly successful and can be carried out under general or local anesthetic. In most cases, the recipient of the organ does not experience physical problems but will have to take immunosuppressant drugs to prevent their body rejecting the new organ (Dykstra, 2004; Sirico, 2002). However, these side effects are a small price to pay in light of the alternative, which is often a severely compromised quality of life and early death. The donor should consider several topics. There is no additional financial risk to being an organ donor.

Furthermore, the body is not disfigured during organ removal; thus, open casket funerals are possible. Also, donated organs will be used for transplants into recipients and will not be used for other purposes without prior permission. In summary, the risk:benefit ratio of organ donation after death is extremely favorable. There is no risk to the appearance of the body or to finances of the survivors. Most importantly, these procedures are desperately needed given the lack of current donors and the increasing age of Americans.

Overall, no good reason exists not to donate organs after death and all should consider this.