Minority organ donors needed

Groups create awareness day to get more people to sign donor cards

By Elizabeth Putnam

Wausau Daily Herald

August 1, 2005

Julia Yang endures hours of dialysis each week to take out the impurities in her blood, and the only way Yang's health will improve is with a kidney transplant.

Yang, 36, of Wausau is one of 89,000 people in the United States on waiting lists for organs. And although donors can be of any race or ethnicity, experts say transplants involving donors and recipients from the same race or ethnicity have a greater chance of success because of similar blood types.

By the numbers 1,150 The number of people in Wisconsin who are waiting for an organ transplant. Thirty-five percent of those people are minorities. 25 The percent of minority motorists in Wisconsin who have indicated on their drivers licenses that they are organ donors. 50 The percentage of those on the kidney transplant waiting list in Wisconsin who are minorities. Source: Wisconsin Coalition on Donation

But the rate of organ donation among minority populations in the United States has not kept up with the demand for transplants for minorities.

That's why, nationwide, organizations dedicated to increasing awareness of the importance of organ, tissue, eye and blood donation have proclaimed today National Minority Donor Awareness Day. The goal is to increase the number of people who sign donor cards.

"This day is a wonderful opportunity for people of diverse cultures to learn how they can make a difference in helping thousands of critically ill people in their communities," said Tim Olsen, president of the Wisconsin Coalition on Donation.

About 60 percent of those on waiting lists for organs are minorities. But only 26 percent of the 142,000 donors in the past 15 years have been minorities, according to the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network, a nonprofit company chartered by the federal government to organize the nation's organ transplant system.

The black population makes up a significant portion of the donor waiting list at 34 percent. That's because the best-matched blood for black patients comes from people of the same race.

About organ donation More than 20,000 organ transplants, 46,000 eye transplants and 750,000 tissue transplants are performed each year in the United States. Organ donations include the heart, lungs, kidneys, pancreas, liver and intestines. Corneas, bones, skin, heart valves, tendons and cartilage also can be donated. On the back of your drivers license you can mark your wish to be an organ donor. Also, tell family members you want to be a donor. For more information, call the Wisconsin Coalition on Donation at 414-805-4695 or go to Wisconsin Coalition on Donation.

About 4,300 Asians are waiting for organ donations. The number of Asian donors has increased steadily in the past 15 years, though the annual average during that period was only about 180 donors.

But Yang, who is Hmong and has five children, remains optimistic that she soon will receive a new kidney. Family members were tested, but no one was a match.

"I am still waiting," she said.

Copyright © 2004 Gannett Wisconsin Online.

This article posted August 22, 2005.