No Need To Be Dead To Give Up Your Organs

I'm not quite sure what the shock is here. The slide toward harvesting organs from living patients is already under way - and has been for a while.

Shock: requiring death before organ donation is unnecessary, say experts

Because organ donors are often alive when their organs are harvested, the medical community should not require donors to be declared dead, but instead adopt more “honest” moral criteria that allow the harvesting of organs from “dying” or “severely injured” patients, with proper consent, three leading experts have argued. more

Here's Why We Should Always Err On The Side Of Life

Here’s why we should never, ever, assume people in persistent unresponsive states are “brain dead,” or to use a common epithet, “vegetables.” Just before Richard Rudd’s ventilator was turned off, a doctor checked one more time. Guess what, Richard was very much alive and able to communicate.

Blink, and you live – doctors' message to man in a coma

Richard Rudd and his father at Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridgeshire. Photograph: BBC Wales/Rudd family

A man who was left paralysed and seemingly unable to communicate following a traffic accident was saved from having his life support machine turned off when he managed to blink three times to tell doctors that he did not want to die. more

So, How Dead Do You Need To be? New US Guidelines

So, new US medical guidelines to establish when someone is dead. It’s a step in the right direction, seeing that until now the guidelines have been varied and allowed for the possibility of someone being diagnosed as brain dead when they weren’t. Major question: In the race to harvest organs, will doctors abide by these guidelines, seeing that the guidelines essentially increase the time from actual death to diagnosis of death. I’m not too hopeful here.

When is someone brain dead? Experts revise guidelines

Determining brain death is a complex process that requires dozens of tests to make sure doctors come to the correct conclusion. With that goal in mind, the American Academy of Neurology has issued new guidelines — an update of guidelines first written 15 years ago — that call on doctors to conduct a lengthy examination,

including following a step-by-step checklist of some 25 tests and criteria that must be met before a person can be considered brain dead. more