Ethics Opinions

Donation of nonvital organs and tissue from living donors can increase the supply of organs available for transplantation, to the benefit of patients with end-stage organ failure. Enabling individuals to donate nonvital organs is in keeping with the goals of treating illness and relieving suffering so long as the benefits to both donor and recipient outweigh the risks to both.

Physicians should support innovative approaches to increasing the supply of organs for transplantation but must balance this obligation with their duty to protect the interests of their individual patients. Organ donation after cardiac death is one approach being undertaken to make greater numbers of transplantable organs available.

In the context of prospective organ donation from an anencephalic newborn, physicians may ethically provide ventilator assistance and other medical therapies that are necessary to sustain organ perfusion and viability until such time as a determination of death can be made in accordance with accepted medical standards, but may only retrieve and transplant the organs of an anencephalic newborn after such determination of death.

Organ transplantation is unique in that it involves two patients, donor and recipient, both of whose interests must be protected. Concern for the patient should always take precedence over advancing scientific knowledge.