Are you looking for that extra special present to give someone? Well how about giving up a little bit of yourself, or more specifically one of your organs, your blood or marrow?
Becoming an organ, blood or marrow donor holds the promise of life for thousands of patients with life-threatening conditions and diseases. Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin has seen the impact that organ donation can have for children and families awaiting a transplant. We perform heart, liver and kidney transplants. Many of our children wait months or years for an organ transplant.
The Organ Procurement and Transplant Network shows nearly 2,000 children in the U.S. are waiting for an organ transplant. Approximately 7 percent of children died in 2010 while waiting on the list for an organ transplant. Organs from adult donors often are too large to place into young children. Parents, relatives or friends sometimes can donate a kidney or part of a liver to a child. However, most children are placed on the waiting list for an organ from someone who has died.
The Blood and Marrow Transplant Program at Children’s Hospital is one of the largest in the U.S. using unrelated individuals or mismatched family members as donors. Blood and Marrow Transplants are used successfully to treat a number of cancers, blood diseases and immune disorders that were once considered incurable. Many children who have surgery also rely on life-saving blood donations.
~ Cinda Werner, MS, RN, director, Trauma and Transplant Services, Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin