Dr. Gail Miflin OBE and Professor John Forsythe OBE, Co-Chairs of the Organ Donation Joint Working Group, call for a bolder, braver approach for organ donation in the UK. They argue that the next step change in organ donation will not come from public awareness and policy alone, but from renewed clinical leadership.
Nearly 20 years after the Organ Donation Taskforce recommended that organ donation should become a usual and expected part of end-of-life care, progress has not reached this goal. This is why a new report - A bolder, braver approach for organ donation in the UK — has been launched by the Organ Donation Joint Working Group (ODJWG) — a group Jointly Chaired by the Department of Health and Social Care and NHS Blood and Transplant. The group brought together national and international organ donation experts from five countries, donor families and service providers, to identify actions to maximise the number of lives saved through the gift of deceased organ donation.
This work built on the positive developments (such as the change in legislation) and drew lessons from less successful approaches. Professor John Forsythe and Dr. Gail Miflin (co-chairs of the ODJWG) argue that the next step change in organ donation will not come from public awareness and policy alone, but from renewed clinical leadership, confidence and ownership at the bedside.
The report lays out 10 ambitious actions for improving organ donation rates and ultimately reducing the national transplant waiting list. Many of these are directly actionable by those in clinical settings who have the power to make a real difference.
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