Organ donation from a donor family perspective

April is Organ Donation Awareness month in Canada. I wrote the following article for the Ottawa Gift of Life network as part of their month of organ donation stories.

My 63-year-old husband David had a hemorrhagic stroke one morning at home.  I did chest compressions, paramedics restarted his heart, but by the time we got to the hospital 70% of his brain was destroyed by a brain bleed.  As the doctors put it, “His condition is incompatible with life.” But he had died in my arms, so that was not a shock. Our children and his two closest friends gathered to say goodbye. When I suggested it was time to turn off the machines that were keeping his body alive, two Trillium Gift of Life nurses gently approached me and asked if I would consider giving permission for his organs to be used.

David had not registered as a donor. Strangely, although he was a medical ethicist, we had never talked about organ donation. But his goal in the latter part of his life was not for material success or fame, but to be a kind person. So for me there was no question.  What followed was a long and detailed interview with the two nurses during which they asked many questions about his medical past.  They were very patient and kind and understanding. How hard it must be to talk to family members at the worst moments of their lives.  At the end of the interview they told me that before any surgery was done, the medical staff would pause in the operating room, and any thing that we wanted to say about David would be read aloud.  That was comforting.

We said the final goodbye. But we left a warm body that was still breathing with mechanical help. That was hard.

Over the next night and day, I received updates from the Gift of Life transplant coordinator as tests were carried out to determine which organs could be used, and answered yet more questions.  He was finally officially declared dead over 36 hours after the stroke, and the surgeries began. 

By the second morning, his lungs and liver had been transplanted into two different people. Despite the fact that he was nearly blind, his corneas were used to give sight to two others.  The team also collected skin and bone to be stored for use later on. Most amazingly, the pancreas of a man with Type 2 diabetes would be used to collect islet cells for the Edmonton protocol treatment for people with Type 1 diabetes. 

To be honest, none of this mattered to me at the time. It did nothing to ease the grief.  Gradually though I have met many wonderful people who are alive because of transplants from deceased donors. I now volunteer with the Gift of Life organization to help spread awareness and information about organ donation.

David was gone; he no longer needed the organs and tissues.  For me, the real heroes are those people who are on the waiting lists, those who have received transplant, and their families and the medical teams who help them.  I still don’t know if he would have wanted me to say yes, but it doesn’t matter.  His body gave the chance of life to others and that was David’s ultimate act of kindness.