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What to
Donate
When people agree to be donors, they can choose to donate their vital
organs or tissues for transplant purposes, or they can donate their entire
bodies to medical science, which is often called whole body donation.
There are five different vital organs used in transplants:
| Testing For Brain Death |
A series of bedside tests are performed
on a patient before brain death can be declared, says Vivian Brailoff,
director of critical care at John Muir Medical Center in Walnut
Creek, CA.
One test checks for cerebral blood
flow. An isotope is
introduced into the blood and then a machine registers if the isotope
has been carried to the brain. If the isotope is not found in the
brain, the patient is brain dead, Brailoff says.
When brain-death testing begins,
hospital staff contacts the California Transplant Donor Network,
she says. CTDN is the organ procurement organization with which
the hospital works. |
Before any of these organs can be removed from a donor patient, the person
must be declared brain dead, which means that the brain is no longer functioning.
If a brain-dead patient is medically suitable to be an organ donor, and
if the next of kin has given consent, trained coordinators from an organ
procurement organization will maintain the donor. This is a complex task
that involves using a ventilator and various drugs that keep oxygen flowing
to the vital organs of the body until the organs can be recovered.
Besides the vital organs, portions of the gastrointestinal tract, such
as the stomach and the small and large intestines,
may also be recovered and used in transplant.
Tissues
These include corneas, heart valves, bone and skin. To be a tissue donor,
it is not necessary for the patient to be kept on a ventilator. When all
body functions, including those of the heart and brain, have stopped,
a person can potentially donate tissue if found medically suitable. For
example, if a person is in a car accident and they die at the scene, they
may be considered for tissue donation.
Whole Body Donation
Rather than donating their organs or tissues for transplant, people also
can donate their bodies to science for use in teaching at medical schools.
This is known as anatomical gift donation,
and while it doesn't receive the publicity that transplantation does,
it is still important to the advancement of science and medicine.
©2003 Gina Comparini
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