Organ Donor
 

In November my wife received a life saving heart transplant. Below is a short video that she made to tell her story and promote becoming an organ donor as part of Donate Life Colorado's push during organ donor awareness month. Share the link if you like.

r/mp


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8vn9b0rXxwI

Fantastic video,

Best wishes to Beth and you..

Thanks for the reminder, It just went out to everyone on my email list.

JJ

Glad to hear your wife is doing well. Send her my thanks for sharing her story.

An additional note: Talk to your family/next of kin about your intentions to be an organ donor. Regardless of your intentions, they wll need to give consent for organ harvesting for donation.

http://www.transplants.org/OrganTissueDonation.php

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All, Thanks for your posts and sharing of the video.

RF, Beth was on a BiVAD TLC 2 plus driver manufactured by Thoratec for 5 1/2 months. You can see pictures of the driver in her video and the drive lines running under her shirt are connected to canulas that entered the left side of her abdomen. All of her blood flow was controlled by the driver and her heart was set at 82 BPM. She now goes to see all of the new patients at UCH that are being placed on a BiVAD to counsel then and encourage them in their fight. She is really an inspiration!

r/Mike

So very glad to hear your wife is doing well, thanks for sharing this!

I've had my donor intentions on my DL for years now, and have told family members.

Fantastic Video. Give Beth my best!

We, here in Florida, have an option on our drivers license, for a designation that signifies us as organ donors. I have had mine there for the past 20 yrs. I figure if I am a goner, I cannot use this stuff and someone else can, more power to em! It is another reason I keep myself healthy and fit. The better I take care of me, and my insides, the more use they will be to someone who needs them after I don't.

Check with your home states and see if your drivers license can carry the organ donar designation.

GIVE THE GIFT OF LIFE!
AM

Very cool video, thanks for sharing! I've been an organ donor since I could drive and a bone marrow donor since I was in the military. Great programs!

Thanks for sharing the video and all the very best to your wife.
That is an amazing story.

I've been a registered donor for many years.

PedOncoDoc,
Good info.

Families have trumped the organ donor designation on a driver's license - hence the need to discuss your intentions with your next of kin regardless.

I worked on a transplant ICU for a few years and saw some amazing things there.

And you are right....families can intervene and "trump" the donation process. So speaking to them is inmportant. If there is any dissent things most likely will not work out as everything must move quicly for the obvious reasons. And rightfully so. The day organ donation is enforced is a bad day.


mffjm8509, wish your wife and yourself many more blessings to come-

I concur with Bill,God Bless Beth and You..........:):):)

Big Teddy

Bone marrow registry
 

Our family learned the hard way of the importance of registering as a bone marrow donor. Sometimes even family does not make a good match for a marrow transplant and the wait to find a match can truely be a killer. This procedure is no longer the painful one that it used to be and you truely will be a life saver to some one.

Complete story

Register here

Attachment 15193

As both a recipient of, and physician overseeing, bone marrow transplants I second this wholeheartedly. With the availability of cord blood, suitable ("close enough") matches are becoming easier to find for people, but cord blood is of limited utility to grown adults. The best bet is to have as many people register as possible - just as with organ donation, exception being you can donate marrow and go home the same day - not so much for a heart.

I would also encourage donating blood for all those who are cleared to do so.

My $.02...

While luckily I have not had the need for replacement organs, blood or marrow, I have had my OD sticker on every drivers license since my first and donate blood regularly since the first time they came to my high school gym Junior year. And I make sure to extol its values to those who don't.

This post has been great. Congrats to you and Beth, and I'll have to look more into bone marrow donation.