Debate raging over infant organ donation

An approach to infant organ donation is causing debate. Some doctors are removing infants organs before they are considered brain dead. Instead, doctors are removing the organs after the babies are declared dead cardiocirculatory (after the heart stops). This article at ABC News explores both sides of organ harvests, whether the infants give up their organs before or after they are brain dead.

Doctors believe that there is a greater chance at saving more babies if their organs are harvested after their heart stops and the parents choose not to resuscitate the child. This situation could lead to a dramatic increase in the number of infants that become organ donors, which in turn saves more lives. Doctors for this method see two problems solved by obtaining the organs after the baby’s heart has stopped: fewer infants die while they are waiting on transplants, and there will be more parents who will have the opportunity to donate their children’s organs.

There is a fear that doctors will look over the dying children, and instead focus on the ones they can save. However, each child’s life is precious, and many doctors will focus on saving their patients. What do you believe is the best approach for infant organ donation?

Should organ donors choose who their organs go to?

In a recent blog post at the Wall Street Journal Health blog, they brought up a raging topic in the medical world: Should donors get to choose who their organs go to? In the past such a decision was not so easily available to potential donors, but today websites such as www.matchingdonors.com offer a direct access to donors and potential recipients. However doctors are fearful that those chosen will jump ahead on the organ donor list, leaving those at the top of the list waiting for the next available organ.

This is not a new topic in the medical world, the debate has been raging for years. In this article at the New England Journal of Medicine, they address many of the issues that could come with organ donors choosing their recipients. According to the journal, there are three types of donations that can occur:

-- Directed donation to a loved one or friend

-- Nondirected donation, in which the donor gives an organ to the general pool to be transplanted into the recipient at the top of the waiting list

-- Directed donation to a stranger, whereby donors choose to give to a specific person with whom they have no prior emotional connection.

One of the comments left by reader, SavvyDoc, on the WSJ blog post, expressed that if organ donors got to choose who their organs went to; it could in time result in organs going to the highest bidder. Worse still is the potential of discriminatory when donating organs such as the example of a white man only wanting his organs to go to other white people (As found in the New England Journal of Medicine article).

With the current shortage we have on donated organs, should this be allowed to happen? Currently, donations are only from those who are brain dead or those who willingly give up their organs that are not needed. But could donations increase if individuals were allowed to pick who it’s given to? Most likely the debate will continue for some time before an acceptable resolution is proposed.