WORLD ORGAN DONATION DAY

Organ donation can save or improve lives of people in need. Sometimes, an illness related to organ failure is so serious that organ transplantation becomes the only hope for them to lead a healthy life.

The World Organ Donation Day is a global event that is observed every year on 13th August. It is a day to raise awareness about the necessity of organ donation. The day is celebrated to encourage and educate people on the importance of donating organs after death to save more lives. Organ donations such as kidneys, heart, pancreas, eyes and lungs can save the lives of people suffering from chronic diseases.

Organ transplantation saves lives by replacing damaged or failing organs with healthy ones. Organ failure has been one of the leading morbidities, with more lives lost in the pandemic and the past.

Many needy patients lose their lives because of the lack of organ availability. Deceased donors play a vital role in curbing the spiking organ requirement, as one deceased donor can save up to eight persons.

World Organ Donation Day, 2023 theme is "Step up to volunteer; need more organ donors to fill the lacunae". The theme for this year focuses on telling more people about the importance of organ donation. If more people pledge to donate their organs then we can save more lives. Ronald Lee Herrick was the first person to donate his organ. In 1954, he donated his kidney to his twin brother, and Dr. Joseph Murray was the doctor, who carried out this successful organ transplantation process, who in 1990, was honoured with the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine for bringing advances in organ transplantation. In 2021, globally 1,44,302 organ transplantations had occurred, where 26.44% (38,156) are of deceased organ donation. India had performed a total of 12,259 transplantation, which contributes 8% to the global transplantations, where the major ones are for kidneys (74.27%) followed by liver (23.22%), heart (1.23%), lung (1.08%), pancreas (0.15%) and small bowel (0.03%). The overall number of deceased donors’ transplantations in India are 4.5% (552). A healthy donor is most important. An organ donation can be done by anyone regardless of age, caste or religion. However, it is imperative to ensure that aspiring organ donors do not suffer from chronic illnesses such as HIV, cancer, heart and lung disease. Living donor can donate one kidney, one lung, a

part of the liver, pancreas and intestine. However, in case of a deceased donor, both the kidneys and lungs, heart, pancreas, intestine, hands and face can be donated and used.