[McLynnan]

I work in a hospital setting dealing with patients who are sometimes pronounced brain dead due to trauma. In my facility nobody gets different treatment because they have or have not signed a donor card or whether they do or do not have insurance. Nothing is done without family consent and families are not pressured. Flow studies are done on the brain at different intervals to diagnose brain death. I’m sure there are abuses within the system, but they aren’t the norm and I’ve never seen anything that raised my ethical eyebrows. There is so much oversight and review by different parties it would be very difficult for graft to occur. The people involved in the process are caring, well trained, and ethical. They are involved because they are committed to saving lives, but not at the expense of murdering an ill or injured patient. The harvest team doesn’t come from within the hospital. They have no contact with the donor or the donor’s family. I will look at your links with an open mind, but ask you have an open mind too. The picture being painted on this thread of money grubbers butchering patients to line their pockets is ludicrous. This is not something done lightly — our whole facility is saddened when a life is lost and dollar signs are far from anybody’s mind.

[sodpoodle]

“””I work in a hospital setting....”

Beautifully written and comforting to those who support organ transplantation.

I do not share the philosophy that organ harvesting & replanting is “a life well lived”, for the donor or recipient.

[narses]

You post is filled with clear inaccuracies. Organs are almost always harvested from a living patient. It is murder or suicide. In the instant case it was murder.

The harvest team doesn’t come from within the hospital. They have no contact with the donor or the donor’s family.

Read the story. The "harvest team" was INTRODUCED to the family by the hospital. My gas-passer friend tells me that the glee in the butchers voice as they dismember the living body and talk about the monetary value of the organs is real and constant.

[John D]

There are several on this thread who know nothing, absolutely nothing about transplantation. I admit, I do not know everything, but my wife is a dialysis nurse and has gone through many kidney transplants with her patients.
She has assured me if I should be in an accident nothing different will happen to me just because I have signed a donor card. It does not matter if I sign a donor card or not, my organs can not be removed without her consent.

[shhrubbery!]

OK, maybe everything is done ethically at your particular hospital.

But I think it's pretty clear from the links I posted that that isn't true everywhere.

Btw, in my haste to finish my post (had to leave the computer suddenly last night) I mistakenly typed in brackets that Washington, DC already legally permits organ harvesting without consent.

What I meant to type was that Washington DC legally permits prepping a patient for organ harvesting without consent.

IOW, doctors in DC may without consent perform surgical procedures upon a patient, who is deemed a potential donor, that are not intended to help the patient. They may also administer drugs to him that are NOT helpful to saving his life, but are instead aimed at "preserving" his organs for transplant. These are the initial steps in organ harvesting.

Some medical ethicists are strongly opposed to this practice, because
(a) these drugs and surgical procedures can hasten the patient's death and
(b) the practice puts more pressure on the patient's family to donate.

See here for an interesting debate, hosted by Charlie Gibson on Good Morning America, on this practice in Washington DC.