Organ registry debuts

By Daniel Novinson

April 5, 2005

JON CASTO/The Stanford Daily Rick Dewey informs Nick Benavides and Greg Nawman about California's new organ donor registry, found at DonateLifeCalifornia.org.

More than 87,000 Americans -- about 18,000 of whom are Californians -- are waiting for an organ transplant, and 17 patients on the waitlist die every day. In response, the California Transplant Donor Network, or CTDN, announced yesterday in White Plaza the launch of the DonateLifeCalifornia.org, a statewide online organ-donation registry. Officials said they hope the registry will decrease the time patients wait for life-saving operations.

The press conference, which included a speech by Palo Alto mayor Jim Burch, kicked off a four-hour event to promote organ donation at Stanford. The CTDN showcased a race car owned by heart transplant recipient Wendell Chambers; raffled off the snowboard of 2002 Olympic bronze medalist and liver transplant recipient Chris Klug; and provided computers in the plaza to encourage passersby to register on the newly created Web site.

The site allows users to register if they wish to donate organs upon their death by entering basic demographic information and an e-mail address. Several other states have switched to online donor registries. California officials said they are following suit because the online system is superior to their previous system, in which potential donors indicated their preferences merely by affixing a small pink sticker to their driver's licenses.

"I think it'll help to organize a database," said first-year law student Liz Oosterhuis who, along with five other first-year medical students, helped organize the press conference as a public service project. "In case someone doesn't have a donor card on them, this can now serve as the backup method."

CTDN Community Outreach Coordinator Cathy Olmo agreed with Oosterhuis.

"Today's a great day for the state of California," Olmo said. "In the previous system, donors weren't registered anywhere and the dots often fell off. Now, donors can sign up and make that decision stick. We hope we will save the lives of many more people."

But precisely how many more people the online registry will rescue remains to be seen.

"There is no concrete goal because this is the first stab at the issue," Oosterhuis said.

Senior Afraaz Irani, who also helped bring the press conference to Stanford, said he just hoped the event's publicity would encourage students to consider donating.

"The campus is close-knit," Irani said. "Our primary goal is to start a discussion and no matter what people decide, we've done our job."

No matter how many additional donors the site recruits, surgeons and organ recipients alike have said they will appreciate every individual who volunteers.

"The limiting factor in the entire transplantation process is the shortage of organs," said Carlos Esquivel, the chief transplantation surgeon at Stanford Hospital. "Too many die waiting for organs."

Many who attended the event said that the online registry will usher in a new wave of organ donation efforts.

"I honestly don't even know how to put this event into words," said junior Chris Truxaw, a recipient of a heart transplant in June 1997. "It's something we've needed for awhile and it's great to see California's getting behind this."

Burch echoed Truxaw's enthusiasm for the registry.

"One of the real privileges of my job is getting invited to events like this," Burch said. "This is the ultimate recycling program. I think it's important that people are made aware of the need to donate organs. I think people are aware of the miracle that occurs, but not the need to register."

Copyright © 2004 Stanford Daily Publishing Corporation.

This article posted May 1, 2005.