Tulane Launches National Organ Donor Program

By Ted Griggs

November 23, 2006.

From left: Sander Florman, director, Tulane Center for Abdominal Transplantation and Bill West, liver transplant recipient and donor, Bill West Transplant Research Endowment

Fourteen months after suffering one of the country's worst natural disasters, New Orleans helped launch a national organ donation program that may someday be remembered as one of the nation's greatest successes.

"We know that there aren't nearly enough organs available so large numbers of people die every year," said Dr. Sandor Florman, director of abdominal transplant at Tulane University Hospital & Clinic.

Nationwide, an average of 18 people die each day while waiting for an organ transplant, Florman said.

The Give Five-Save Lives initiative, announced at the National Learning Congress on Organ Donation and Transplantation held at Tulane, is designed to help reduce those numbers by stimulating donations, Florman said.

Dr. Jim Burdick, director of the division of transplantation for the United States Department of Health and Human Services, said the initiative will help businesses and organizations educate employees about organ and tissue donation.

Employers will select three dates between Nov. 20 and Feb. 12 to tell employees that five minutes of the workday will be set aside for them to register their donation decisions. The donations can be made online or with donor cards.

Local organ procurement organizations will provide information about organ donation to each company that participates, Burdick said.

Give Five is part of the 12 Weeks of Giving campaign that aims to register 400,000 new organ donors by Feb. 12.

The campaign has already gained some serious backing. Healthcare giant HCA Inc., whose 182 hospitals include Tulane University Hospital, has committed its 190,000 employees to Give Five.

The 1,300-employee Tulane University Hospital was the first to pledge its support to the Give Five initiative.

If all of the HCA employees decide to donate their organs, the initiative will be halfway to its goal, Florman said.

Gov. Kathleen Blanco has also promised to support the initiative within Louisiana state government and its agencies. Those agencies can reach thousands of potential organ donors.

Blanco said the critical shortage of organ donors throughout the United States and Louisiana must be addressed.

Close to 94,000 people are on the waiting list of United Network for Organ Sharing, or UNOS. More than 1,600 of those people are Louisiana residents. UNOS is a nonprofit group that helps make sure that organs are procured and distributed in a fair manner.

"We don't ask for bad things to happen to people," Florman said. "We're just hoping to make something good happen out of something bad."

Florman said a major goal of the Give Five initiative will be educating people about organ donation and clearing up some commonly held misperceptions.

For example, people often say their religion prohibits them from donating, he said. But the truth is that nearly every religious organization in the world has endorsed organ donation.

Burdick said some people mistakenly think that hospitals will charge them or their families for any medical costs incurred during organ harvesting.

Most organs are "gifts," given by the families of people who have died, Burdick said. Under federal law, hospitals and other providers cannot charge donors or their families for any of the costs related to organ donation.

Burdick said the organ shortage is not the result of people objecting to organ donation. It's more that people in the United States don't like to think about death and other "end-of-life" issues, he said.

It's too late to talk to people about organ donation when one of their family members is in critical condition, he said. That's one reason why it's so important to educate people about organ donation well ahead of time.

Florman said although many people check off the organ donor space on their driver's licenses, that usually isn't a strong enough declaration for a hospital or doctor.

A person may want to donate his or her organs, but if the donor doesn't tell family members his wishes, the family members often object, Florman said. No hospital is going to try to get a court order to take a donor's organs.

Florman said one organ donor can take up to nine people off the organ transplant waiting list, Florman said, and that's just from the solid organs, which include the heart, lungs, kidney, liver, pancreas, and intestines.

One organ donor can potentially save as many as 50 other people, Florman said.

"It's not a big stretch to say if we can increase donation, we can stop people on the waiting lists from dying, and we can save others who are also suffering," Florman said.

Copyright © 2006 Acadiana Medical News.

This article posted November 26, 2006.