Trisha
Member
Username: Tlipsco3
Post Number: 4
Registered: 02-2012
| | Posted on Friday, March 23, 2012 - 09:00 pm: | 
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Allowing organ donors to receive monetary incentives for donation has been debated for years. In attempts to honor ethical concerns regarding buying organs, such as honoring the human body, protecting potential donors, and preventing donation for only monetary gains, the current system offers little protection to living kidney donors. In an effort to maintain an altruistic motive for donation, multiple disincentives and barriers for donors currently exist. Meanwhile, the wait list continues to grow each year with thousands of people dying without receiving an organ. In addition, we may never know the number of potential donors lost due to barriers.
Living donors do not benefit from the current system. Little help is available to assist with out of pocket expenses related to the donating process. Donors are not guaranteed any short or long term protection. For the sake of maintaining altruistic motives for donation, the donor receives many disadvantages for performing such a wonderful gift of life. Meanwhile, the need for organs continues to increase.
Since current measures to increase donation have not been effective, it is debated whether monetary reimbursements could impact the number of donors. Proposals to remain within the NOTA as it is written link any donor compensation to the donors risks. They vary from providing donors with different benefits such as life insurance, health insurance, and cash. Some also include follow-up care to allow data collection to assess for long-term risk. The overall costs of providing donor safety measures, while acknowledging their unmet needs, is estimated between $23,000 and $33,000. This still saves the healthcare system over $50,000 by someone receiving a transplant versus being on dialysis.
I am conducting a study to examine the opinion and experiences of previous living kidney donors and kidney transplant recipients. Little has been devoted to study donor or recipient perspectives or the current donation process and policies. The opinion and life experiences of donors and recipients should provide valuable information about the positive and negatives in the current system. This information can be used to help reshape the future transplant system. The “wait” needs to be eliminated from the deceased donor kidney transplant wait list.
Your opinion counts, please complete the survey: http://edu.surveygizmo.com/s3/767244/f516cf59275b |
