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This week is Organ Donation Week and in celebration of this incredibly selfless act, we decided to spend the week exploring different aspects not only of the donation itself, but the difference it makes to those who qualify for transplant. The thing is, when you talk about organ donation, its very easy to go straight to the fact that someone has lost their life for someone else to live.
Whilst this is an incredibly sobering and undeniable truth, there are also opportunities to donate whilst you are still alive and today, we wanted to look at what those options are and how you can put yourself forward for this.
We are all familiar with kidney donation, and we will come back to that but actually, what a lot of people don’t realise is that certain tissue can also be donated.
- Bone Donation
One of the things I love about writing these is the amount of new information I discover. Everyday is a school day and this one has been no exception. The donation of bone is something that happens quite frequently and something I have never ever come across.
Although the hospitals that are able to do this around the UK are few and far between, if you are having a bone removed during surgery and wanted to donate the tissue then the option is there to do so. The bone is tested to ensure that it doesn’t carry any viruses and then sent to a specialist tissue facility for storage until its needed. From there, it will be used as a bone graft when a suitable recipient is found. This can help massively towards restoring not only health, but mobility for many patients.
- Blood Donation
We are all familiar with blood donation, and although there are certain restrictions on this process, there are centres up and down the country that you can donate blood to.
Giving blood saves lives and in the UK alone, around 5000 donations are required every single day. To be able to support the vast mix of patients that walk through its doors every single year, the NHS needs around 173,000 new donors to ensure that they will have the right mix of blood groups to cover all possible eventualities. This is a huge ask for a struggling health service and they rely on the kindness of the public to ensure that as much as is possible is made available to help save those in need. Check out the link below to get signed up for donation.
- Plasma Donation
Plasma makes up about 55% of your blood. Carrying red and white blood cells and platelets around your system, plasma is used to make medicines for rare genetic conditions known as primary immune disorders, liver disease, kidney failure, sepsis and major burns.
Containing antibodies called immunoglobulins and a protein called albumin, this lifesaving fluid is used to treat around 17,000 people a year, saving thousands.
Check out Aurora’s story below.
Click on the below link for more details on becoming a plasma donor.
Sign up to donate – NHS Give Blood
- Placenta Donation
For those of us in the right age bracket, I am sure you will remember the craze around 15 years ago for ‘placenta pate’, For a short while, it became the in thing to take the placenta home after giving birth and eat it. We know how it sounds but there was method in the madness. The placenta is packed with nutrients that keep your baby healthy so the belief was that consuming it would help recover from the physical trauma of the birth.
Although there is no scientific evidence in place yet to confirm this, around 25% of women try it out.
What you may not realise is that placental donation has become massively important in reconstructive surgery. The tissues from the placenta can be used as a graft or a dressing and are also regularly used within ophthalmological surgery. If you decided that you wanted to go ahead with donation, the delivery of the baby is done by C-section which allows the surgical team to preserve the tissue at its very best. From there, the whole umbilical cord and placenta is taken to a specialist tissue facility and processed ready for when it is needed.
Donation is dependant on there being no viruses present in the body at the time of the birth and certain illnesses or lifestyles can prevent donation from being possible. If this was an option you wanted to consider however, all this would be discussed with you prior to making a decision.
- Stem Cell Donation
Stem cells are a unique and special cell that are responsible for making more than 200 different cell types within the body. As the only cell that can actually do this, they are incredibly important to the day to day running of your system and cell reproduction. Cleveland Clinic have a wonderful way of describing the process which is much better than I could have.
‘If your body were a building, your stem cells would be the foundation. One stem cell type builds your body. After building your body, another stem cell type serves as maintenance crew teams assigned to specific structures.’ Stem Cells: Types, What They Are & What They Do (clevelandclinic.org)
The importance of stem cells in donation lies in the fact that certain treatments for diseases like blood cancers, sickle cell anaemia, multiple myeloma, non-hodgkin lymphoma and others are toxic not only to the disease itself, but also to tissues within the body.
The damage to cells caused by radiotherapy, chemotherapy etc means that they are unable to rebuild. Stem donation from viable donors gives the patient their best chance at survival from these diseases.
Scientists are only really just beginning to understand the incredible job that these cells do within the human body, and their potential when used for treatment but already, this kind of treatment is life changing.
As with the other things that we have mentioned today, its simple to get your name on the register but extremely rare to be called up for this as 70% of the patients require matching tissue.
Check out Sethu’s story.
How signing up saves lives – NHS Blood Donation
- Liver Donation
This is one that none of us were aware of in the office. Although liver donation happens often after death, it is also possible to donate part of your liver as a living donor.
Every year in the UK, approximately 900 people undergo liver transplantation which leaves around 600 people on the transplant list every year still waiting and those numbers continue to rise. The average loss of life due to a lack of available organs currently lies at around 15-20% of patients which is devastating.
For those patients with end stage liver disease, the chances of a healthy liver becoming available are very slim, and this is where part donation comes in. The donation can be used for patients with primary liver cancer, end stage liver disease and children with metabolic diseases. Unlike other living donation processes however, this one is much more in depth and requires a lot more testing. In this instance, a psychological assessment is also done as the donation process is much more invasive and can be quite distressing and emotional.
- Kidney Donation
Last, but by no means least is kidney donation.
Probably the most well known, about a third of all kidney transplants in the UK actually come from living donors. Living donors offer a much better outcome for the patient, and with around 1100 transplants happening every year, the amount of people in need is huge.
Volunteering to donate a kidney is amazing, and with more than 5000 people on the transplant list in the UK, hundreds die every year whilst waiting for a suitable donation. As with part liver donation, donating a kidney is a huge decision and not one that should be taken lightly. If you decide that this is something you would like to do though, there is some fantastic information online about the process and testing that is involved.
Check out a couple of the stories of people whose lives were saved as a result of donation.
No matter what the donation, every small gesture helps towards making a big difference to somebodies life and should never be taken lightly. Whether blood, plasma, tissue or a kidney – being able to offer that chance is a huge thing.
It should always be something that you are comfortable with and you should never feel like you are being pushed into something that you don’t want to do. There are so many websites that go through the pro’s and cons of donation but at the end of it all, it has to be a decision that you have understood fully and completely support.
If you want anymore details on donation, we have popped a couple of links below for you. Make a cuppa and check them out because you never know what difference you could make until you look.
