National leaders and health care providers
from across the country are working together to increase
the rate of organ donation and provide more transplantable
organs for people whose lives depend on the gift of life.
The Organ Donor and Transplant Breakthrough Collaborative,
a program of the US Department of Health and Human Services,
is aimed at maximizing the supply of available organs from
deceased donors.
 According to the NJ Sharing
Network, this region’s organ procurement agency,
one individual who donates after death can provide organs,
bone and tissue for up to 50 people in need. “We
already know what practices yield high rates of donation,” says
Barbara Turci, Director of Hospital Services at NJ Sharing
Network. “The goal of the Breakthrough Collaborative
is to educate health care providers and implement those
successful methods at all of the nation’s hospitals.”
Before the Collaborative began in 2002, on average
only 46 percent of potential organ donors in the United States
became actual donors. “A key objective of the Collaborative
is to increase the rate of organ donation to 75 percent at
the nation’s largest hospitals,” says Ms. Turci. “In
the State of New Jersey, that rate has already climbed to
61 percent.”
“We have opened an important dialog between
the physicians and nurses who care for potential donors and
the transplant teams,” adds Ms. Turci. While providing
the best possible care to patients who are critically ill
or injured, Emergency Department and Intensive Care physicians
can also manage patients’ medical care in ways that
make organ donation possible, she explains. With the support
of an organ procurement agency, hospital nurses, social workers
and pastoral staff intervene and provide knowledge, sensitivity
and support to families faced with making the decision to
donate on behalf of their loved one.
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