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• Re:Conset to organ donation is a matter of life and not of death.
  Stephen A. Lang
  Published on: 16 July 2014
• Conset to organ donation is a matter of life and not of death.
  Giorgina B Piccoli
  Published on: 8 August 2003

• Published on: 16 July 2014

  Re:Conset to organ donation is a matter of life and not of death.

  • Stephen A. Lang, Wall Mart worker

  I do not agree with this article at all.Some People may have a Religious objection to Organ Donation and,as a Cryonisist,I strongly object to being Autopsied as that would delay My Cryonic Suspension and most likely diminish My chances of ever being reaninmated.It is highly immoral to make Autopsies and Organ Donation Mandatory.People DO have Rights after they Die!!They have the Right to have there final wished respecte...

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  I do not agree with this article at all.Some People may have a Religious objection to Organ Donation and,as a Cryonisist,I strongly object to being Autopsied as that would delay My Cryonic Suspension and most likely diminish My chances of ever being reaninmated.It is highly immoral to make Autopsies and Organ Donation Mandatory.People DO have Rights after they Die!!They have the Right to have there final wished respected and not to have anything done to there Bodies that they don't want done to them.

  Conflict of Interest:

  Cryonics

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  Conflict of Interest:
  None declared.

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• Published on: 8 August 2003

  Conset to organ donation is a matter of life and not of death.

  • Giorgina B Piccoli, Researcher
  • Other Contributors:
    • Elisabetta Mezza , Giorgio Soragna , Manuel Burdese , Stefania Putaggio and Giuseppe P. Segoloni.

  Dear Editor

  As a group of Nephrologists with a lively interest in ethical problems and involved in an educational campaign on dialysis and transplantation, we read with great pleasure the pragmatic and touching editorial of HE Emson;[1] as the senior of the group, I (GBP) had the occasion to watch the moment when the soul departs from the body; without the fear of being “unscientific”, I agree with Dr Emson that whe...

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  Dear Editor

  As a group of Nephrologists with a lively interest in ethical problems and involved in an educational campaign on dialysis and transplantation, we read with great pleasure the pragmatic and touching editorial of HE Emson;[1] as the senior of the group, I (GBP) had the occasion to watch the moment when the soul departs from the body; without the fear of being “unscientific”, I agree with Dr Emson that wherever the soul goes, the body remains as an empty shell. The sadness of departure is enhanced by the fact that we usually know, often in friendly terms, most of the persons we see in the moment of end of life. At the meantime, we share with our dialysis patients the anxious wait for a renal graft, giving back freedom and a better, and hopefully longer life.

  While we agree with the Author that our bodies should be considered as a valuable loan from the biomass, we do not agree with the opinion that the lack of donation is linked to the family attention on a dead body.

  In our country, Italy, about one third of the potential donors are “wasted”, going directly under the ground to produce corn or flowers, due to the family opposition to organ donation.[2] The cult for the dead body, the lack of trust in the Health Care System, the misconceptions on brain death were all considered as potential explanations of this pattern. As dr Emson says, the comments and theorizations are often performed by philosophy experts, not directly involved in the care of the patients, nor in running educational programs.

  In the last three years, in the context of the activities of the post graduate school of Nephrology, we run an educational campaign in Torino, an industrial northern Italian city with about 900,000 inhabitants, progressively involving all the high schools of the city (last two years of high school: median students’ age 17 and 18 years).

  In 2001-2002, 1676 anonymous questionnaires on different aspects of dialysis, transplantation and organ donation were gathered from 14 schools. Students’ opinions were clearly in favour of living kidney donation: 78.2% would donate a kidney to a close relative or partner needing it, witnessing the diffuse knowledge that life with a kidney transplant is highly preferable than life with dialysis. However, the answers on cadaveric donation were sharply different. The question, built as a “collage” of sentences from the newspapers was: “a dear person of your family is in the emergency room; you do not know his/her opinion on organ donation; the doctor says this he/she is brain dead (the heart is still beating with the help of a machine); do you give the consent to organ donation?” the answers were almost evenly divided among yes (35.5%), not (30%), I dont’ know (34.5%). The optional comments, recorded in about half of the questionnaires (blank: 44.4 %) identify in the impossibility of deciding for somebody else (20.5%) and in the fear of causing the “real death” of the beloved person (19.9%) the main reasons for denying consent, followed by the lack of trust in the medical class (3.2%). None of the students mentioned the insult on the dead body nor gave religious motivations; a minority (5.4%) considered organ transplantation an “unnatural” procedure.

  From our data, we suggest that, at least in our setting, the focus for increasing organ donation should be on giving exhaustive information on life (and on end of life), clarifying the concept of brain death, the aims and itineraries of transplantation, more then on fighting with prejudices on death.

  Our direct involvement, as physicians, in educational campaigns may not only give a valuable occasion to get in touch with the general population, but also, as Dr Emson states, to fill the gap between the large number of people who favour organ donation and the small proportion who do anything about it.

  References

  (1) Emson HE. It is immoral to require consent for cadaver organ donation. J Med Ethics 2003;29:125-127.

  (2)http://www.ministerosalute.it/trapianti

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  Conflict of Interest:
  None declared.

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