Mar 5, 2009
Why you should donate your organs
As regular reader and commenter Deron Arnold said in a comment,
If you’re gonna die anyway, I could sure use your lungs.
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© 2012 Abuyo. All rights reserved.
Mar 5, 2009
As regular reader and commenter Deron Arnold said in a comment,
If you’re gonna die anyway, I could sure use your lungs.
* * * * *
You know, thats probably a very reasonable argument for it!
In the UK they are trying to push through ‘compulsory’ donation when you die. That is unless you opt out (rather than having to opt in as it is at the moment).
It isn’t law yet, but as someone would be willing to donate anyway (for the reasons above( it makes sense. Not sure it makes as much sense to those people who wouldn’t be inclined to do so though.
Irony!
The sum of your parts may be worth MORE than you. Some do not donate for fear they may get less medical attention than otherwise. If they die, their parts are worth far more than they are.
Today’s local news headlines an 18 year old snowboarder, with head injuries, and death at a local hospital. His family is suing for $5 million, claiming the hospital intentionally allowed him to die for his parts. Would he have gotten more medical attention if he did not donate?
A trial lawyer will get rich either way.
“Would he have gotten more medical attention if he did not donate?”
That’s exactly what I was going to ask, but more like… if someone’s donating, does that mean that the hospital will give less attention? How much will they try to do “everything they can” in order to first save your life?
wow, never thought of that before ^. Regardless, I think it only makes sense to donate your organs. I am thinking that most likely you will get the same medical attention. Even if not, to die is gain right?
The card’s in my wallet and my family knows my wishes. When I go, somebody’s getting my spare parts. :)
I would consider it if I knew who they’d be going to. I know it sounds bad but I really wouldn’t be comfortable giving my organs to a pedophile or hardened criminal.
i signed my donor card when i was 13, over a decade ago, and my license has the little heart on it. i figure, hey, i don’t need another go-around on this life, but someone else might still need some more time. nothing like a physical “re-birth” by the kind gift of a stranger to kindle a spiritual one, right? ;)
This is, however, another side to the matter:
http://catholicexchange.com/2009/02/24/116192/
You don’t have to wait until you’re dead! You can donate a kidney, a lobe of a lung, part of your liver, pancreas, intestine and bone marrow while you are still living. You can also donate blood. Being a kidney donor was one of the greatest experiences of my life: God let me be in a miracle.
See http://www.transplantliving.org/livingdonation/default.aspx for more info on living organ donors.
Just a comment to say everyone should click the link Travis Seitler posted.
It’s tough to take the linked article on its word since most of the information is coming from a bereaved mother – not exactly an unbiased or expert source. Not that it’s incorrect. I just can’t form an opinion based on it.
I agree with Joel.
Note the following is my opinion:
If am brain dead (aka not coming back, a vegetable) and hooked up to a respirator (the only thing keeping me alive), please let me go Home. Then feel free to take anything and everything you would need.
I will say however, I have heard the same things about if the hospital knows you are an organ donor rumors…still not sure about all that.
Thanks for the post, Abraham. Ever since Michael Jordan retired, organ donation hasn’t received much publicity.
I do feel compelled to respond to the post from Mr. Seitler. The article he linked was especially one-sided and factually inaccurate. The grieving mother was likely still in a state of shock; she was bitter and felt that someone had to be blamed for her son’s accidental shooting death.
Unfortunately, her “research” failed to uncover the truth, and now she feels the urge to castigate a whole area of medicine that she so poorly understands.
Hospitals have a rigid protocol to determine whether or not someone is dead. More than anything, a hospital fears bad publicity and lawsuits.
Do you think there’s any way they are going to allow someone who’s not really dead to have his organs harvested? If there’s even a remote possibility the patient may be resuscitated they are going to focus their expertise on keeping him alive.
Modern medicine can keep your organs “alive” indefinitely–long after your brain has ceased to function.
There are standardized tests they use to determine whether or not the brain could ever resume functioning again.
Once these tests are performed, the grieving family can have complete confidence that their loved one is in fact dead and the organs can be donated.
The only caveat I would mention for potential donor families is to make sure that the physicians and nurses handling the case are following the established guidelines.
There was one incidence supposedly in California where a physician didn’t follow the entire protocol. This can be fairly easily monitored by the grieving family or their designee.
They simply request a copy of the protocol and follow the surgical team through it.
I actually haven’t even brought organ donation up on my own blog, and I don’t try to push others into doing it. It’s a personal and familial decision that should be made with eyes wide open before a tragedy occurs.
But if you’re a donor and you’ve told your family, I and thousands of others sincerely thank you.
Now I’ve gone and exceeded my word limit, but this topic did touch a nerve.
i just pulled out my organ donor card, it was signed on May 2, 1998. i had JUST turned 13.
somehow, i really do believe that my childhood instinct was a good one. i guess i just think that there are all kinds of levels of corruption in our world — is anyone surprised? people are sinful, with or without the saving grace of Jesus. i have no control over the ethics and integrity of any human being. and in all other areas where i lack control, i entrust myself completely into the care of the only One who has any say in it whatsoever. He is in control, and He will not allow the storms of this world to overcome me. He will not withhold His goodness from me.
so, when given the choice, when given the opportunity, i will give and love others at any cost. a-n-y cost. i believe THAT is the gospel.
What about pianos and electronic keyboards?
Organ donation and a series of miracles have kept my oldest brother alive for the past 15 1/2 years – long enough to see his kids reach adulthood and meet his first grandchild, and who knows how much longer he may yet live?
Yep. I’m for it.
chamblee: HAHAHAHA! ahh nice one.
Let’s also support scientific research that can help us grow new organs when we need them. They’ve already found the gene to help us grow new teeth. No dentures or crowns? Sign me up!
Read about it here:
http://www.genengnews.com/news/bnitem.aspx?name=50254053
No-brainer…if I had a couch I wasn’t using and didn’t intend on ever using again, I’d give that away too.
i’m a donor. i mean, on my driver’s license.
out of curiosity, though – how different is the idea of your body being all “parceled out” after death from cremation? the obvious difference is that organ donation actually helps somebody. still, don’t many christians have reservations about cremation because it’s kinda violent and we believe that the body is kinda important? i don’t know all that much about the topic, just wondering what people think..
of course i’m commenting late so i’m not sure anybody will read this, anyway. :]
Very interesting discussion.
When my mom went in for her second heart surgery (9 years after the first one) she made it clear to her children that she didn’t want any ‘heroics’ as she called it. At 79 she felt she wanted to be free to go if that was the right timing and not kept on some kind of life support. As incredibly hard as it is to say the final good-by to your mom, it certainly helped to allievate the feeling that there was someone to blame. (Probably moreso for my siblings who don’t know Christ.) For me knowing that God has all our days planned in his perfect timing was the greatest aid in seeing her go.
It’s just good to think and talk about such things when everyone is still in good health.
I would love to hear a medical professional’s opinion on this. Matt J has told me horror stories of folks that have received donations of some sort and are barely alive and have all kinds of side effects from the anti-rejection drugs. They are suffering from a terrible lack of qulity of live due to receiving a donation.
There are many sides to every issue.
Jan,
In the 15 years since my brother’s transplant, he has many times been barely alive. So many times we have thought, “He’s never coming home from the hospital this time,” or “He’ll never be able to be up and around again,” to say nothing of the many times we were all preparing ourselves for a funeral. Certainly there are people who wouldn’t think much of his quality of life – especially those who only see him in the hospital.
Might he just as well be dead? We don’t think so; we are inexpressibly thankful that he’s still sharing life with us. Nor does it seem that God thinks so, as He has preserved my brother by one truly miraculous , against-all-medical-probability recovery after another. The doctors don’t know what to make of him at all!
“Quality of life” is, in many respects, a dangerously slippery argument.
Appreciate the thoughts on the “quality of life” issue. I agree that it’s a dangerously slippery issue, for the very simple reason that opening a conversation about it inherently presumes that we are qualified to make a judgment! And as believers, our default position is always going to end up being that we are NOT qualified to make that judgment. So I guess the conversation is ok, as long as we don’t take ourselves too seriously in terms of influencing the conclusion.
I’m an organ donar (can’t have my piano)…and maybe I’m weird, but I have one reservation: I don’t want them taking my eyes!!! Now why on earth is that??? Does anyone else have mental reservations as to what is taken?
Carissa, late, but read!! I’m even later!
With re to the pedophile or criminal getting my parts….hmmm……would I put the same limits on financial gifts I give to a Christian ministry? “Don’t use my financial gift to spend time on these types of people”?? I understand the reservation, but it just made me think a little further.
How on EARTH does Abraham stir up so much with just 22 words? I suspect he just sits there some days and grins at ALL THE WORDS the rest of us throw around. (My favorite brother does the same thing.)
My mom’s liver failed unexpectedly a year and a half ago. She had to have an emergency liver transplant. If her donor hadn’t donated, she may not be alive today. Words can’t describe how grateful we are – first, to the Lord who saved her life and second, to the person who donated. Praise the Lord – He works miracles through organ transplants!
Me again.
In answer to a query, yes, organ transplant is fraught with difficulty.
In fact, the 5 year survival for lung transplants is just 50%–meaning that half of us won’t even last 5 more years.
And there’s a whole medical school textbook full of potential complications.
But the length and quality of life measured by objective physical indicators and patient questionnaires is substantially better for those who receive a transplant than for those who don’t.
This is a question I struggled with as well, and I have carefully questioned all the recipients I met to see if transplant was really worth it.
And all of them said it was. Even the ones who only survived a couple months said it was very much worth it.
i am not an organ donor and am not interested in becoming one. am i selfish? is it fear that holds me back? God will be the judge of that.
i do know that the Lord who made the lame to walk and the blind to see, is still the same God yesterday, today and tomorrow.
Wendy,
Choosing not to be an organ donor is not inherently a selfish or fearful act. It could be , but is not necessarily, either.
Not every girl or woman with long hair cuts her hair to give it to Locks of Love either! I would never think to question them as to why they didn’t!
It’s an option anyone may consider and there is no wrong answer.
Interesting conversation going on here, Piper. But no one has mentioned what will happen to those donated organs when the rapture occurs. Brace yourself: my brother-in-law is adamantly opposed to organ donation because when the rapture occurs his organs are going with him and he’d hate to see all of his parts fly out of those who received them. That would be cruel, he says.
[...] recently when Abraham Piper posted about organ donation on his blog, I honestly had no idea people were opposed to it. When i got my [...]
I plan on donating my body, in tact, to medical science. That’s a very strong need, too. Many people don’t realize it. The decision is natural to me. When I think of my organs, the most intimate part of me, continuing on without me I feel so sad, like it isn’t right. When I imagine my body being used to help education countless doctors and advance medicine, I feel good. There’s the decision, right there. Organ donation to random recipients isn’t right for everyone. (Plus, I don’t want to receive them from anyone; again, I want them to be all mine that grew just for me, and not from someone else.) I suppose that could also be considered part of my contribution. If I “need” an organ and decline a donor’s, someone else in need gets it instead!