July 19, 2006

Monthly Record Number of Organ Donors Reported

More lives were saved by organ transplantation in the month of May than in any month ever before! According to data from the nation's Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network (OPTN), operated by United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS), there were 725 deceased organ donors in the United States in May, 2006.

Transplant community meets the challenge

The number of deceased donors increased rapidly in the last two years. This is attributed in part to the Organ Donation Breakthrough Collaborative, the federal government's initiative to save or enhance the lives of thousands each year by sharing and implementing known best practices in organ donation with the nation's largest hospitals to achieve organ donation rates of 75 percent or higher.

Collaborative participants were challenged in September 2004 to strive for a new record of 700 donors recovered in a single month.

Monthly records for deceased organ donors:

• More than 400 deceased organ donors reported for the first time in July, 1990

• 500 donors reported eight years later in April, 1998

• In May 2004, 600 donors reported

• Another benchmark reached in less than two years with 725 donors reported in May, 2006

More lives to save, decisions to record

Even with the increase in donation, there still remains a great need with more than 92,000 patients waiting for an organ transplant in the United States. The transplant community has set the goal of registering 100 million donors in state organ and tissue donor registries throughout the country. Visit Donate Life America's Web site, www.donatelife.net to find out how to make sure your wishes are carried out where you live.

The Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network (OPTN) is operated under contract with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Health Resources and Services Administration, Division of Transplantation by the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS). The OPTN brings together medical professionals, transplant recipients and donor families to develop organ transplantation policy.

http://www.unos.org/news/newsDetail.asp?id=656