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The truth about organ donation

trojanbadger.com

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Re: The truth about organ donation

#21

Post by vadman »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #11
batista wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Hospitals and surgeons will not operate on you unless you are not expected to recover, or regain consciousness. Except when they can cut corners, because "ok, the guy is badly injured, there's some other patient that needs that organ", etc. It's not like they are gonna be extra thorough each time. Humans are known to do that...

It's my impression that Doctors are generally very conservative about this, for 2 major reasons: - they take the Hippocratic oath very seriously. It's a big part of the culture and indoctrination of medical students. - they've seen enough examples of people dying from seemingly minor conditions and others of people recovering from seemingly irrecoverable situations to know that their predictive powers are quite falli…

Do you go to "Doctors" much? You have an extremely idealistic image of them.

Re: The truth about organ donation

#22

Post by robbiep »

thebigshane wrote: post #7
hapkins wrote: post #3

This has to be one of the most intellectually backwards arguments I have ever heard. It is almost on par with arguments presented by christian fundamentalists. Being brain-dead is essentially being dead. Hospitals and surgeons will not operate on you unless you are not expected to recover, or regain consciousness. Being brain-dead, it is also very unlikely that you feel pain. Reflexes can easily still be active even…

While I agree with you overall, I have to nitpick your wording... Being brain-dead, it is also very unlikely that you feel pain Very unlikely? This seems like something that should demand complete[0] confidence. [0]: Ok, ok, maybe not 100% provability, but I want to know more about this surely subjective determination by the doctors. Or is there an automated reading from some machine that can objectively say "Patient…

If you are brain dead you cannot feel pain because your brain is not there to receive the signals. In computer speak, imagine you had a sensor that had external power and continued transmitting input to the CPU- the signals keep coming in, but the CPU is switched off. No processing of pain, no sensation of pain. End of story

Re: The truth about organ donation

#23

Post by alimoeeny »

vannevar wrote: post #18
alimoeeny wrote: post #4

There are quite a lot of misguided statements in this article, like you are "alive" because your heart is beating, or you feel pain if they don't give you pain killers. You should be "brain dead" to be an organ donor. And brain dead means dead, no chance or recovery, I am sure there are cases that mistakes happen but that is a mistake, you need to be confirmed brain dead by quite a lot of doctors to get harvested!

And brain dead means dead, no chance or recovery... The key point of the article is that the test allegedly used to determine brain death isn't a very good one. I'd be curious to know whether the test described (pulling the patient off a respirator for two minutes) is indeed the actual criterion used. It sounds suspiciously simplistic.

No, this is what is disturbing about this article, you can be alive and not able to breath, this is not the test used anywhere in the world, there are tones of tests that they do including EEG that needs to be flat (I think it is repeated a few times with intervals and they make sure the patient is not on any drugs that suppresses the brain and flattens the EEG and ...

Re: The truth about organ donation

#24

Post by colindoc84 »

"Deeper still one finds the profit motive behind the organ donation scam."

The author suggests that misinformation and a philosophical problem is to blame. This is the premise of the article. Then he writes a statement like this. For his assertion he needs to find proof that there's a deliberate campaign to mislead the public.

The author offers nothing of the sort in his citations. His inference is lazy and sensationalist, even before getting into whether his premise is actually true.

Re: The truth about organ donation

#25

Post by mv »

Oh gosh. For every one of the 'miracles' of full recovery from brain death, there are thousands more about people being kept alive waiting for a miracle.

It disgusts me how okay people are with mechanical respirators, TPN feeds, and the like even when there is a As far as heart rate spiking when organ donation operations are performed? You do know this happens during normal operations. Pain medication is given not to help control your pain, but to help control this reflex. In a normal operation pain meds are technically necessary as when you are under the gas your body either doesn't experience or doesn't remember pain. The actual mechanism of action for anesthetic gas is not fully understood. My point is the pian medication is not given for the brain.

yes organ donation can be shady, but that doesn't necessitate boycott.

Re: The truth about organ donation

#26

Post by iharris »

Let's not gloss over the fact that the sole purpose of organ transplants is to save lives. I have a hard time believing his argument about financial motivation for organ donation - a surgeon's salary should preclude the temptation of "making a quick buck" through questionable organ transplant practices.

On the other hand, I absolutely think that potential donors need to give INFORMED consent when they fill out their donor card - whether advised by a medical professional or with their own research. Obviously, no one should ever be coerced or manipulated into consenting based on false pretenses. I'm aware that I will still be "alive" - at least physiologically - at the time an organ is harvested, but I trust that my family can make the right decision if I'm unconscious, and I'd prefer to have a shot at saving someone's life when I'm on my way out.

Re: The truth about organ donation

#27

Post by [deleted] »

robbiep wrote: post #22
thebigshane wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I agree with you overall, I have to nitpick your wording... Being brain-dead, it is also very unlikely that you feel pain Very unlikely? This seems like something that should demand complete[0] confidence. [0]: Ok, ok, maybe not 100% provability, but I want to know more about this surely subjective determination by the doctors. Or is there an automated reading from some machine that can objectively say "Patient…

If you are brain dead you cannot feel pain because your brain is not there to receive the signals. In computer speak, imagine you had a sensor that had external power and continued transmitting input to the CPU- the signals keep coming in, but the CPU is switched off. No processing of pain, no sensation of pain. End of story

[deleted]

Re: The truth about organ donation

#28

Post by fr0sty »

SpikeGronim wrote: post #15

My wife is an operating room nurse. She sometimes participates in organ transplants. She tells me that there is an anesthesiologist present and giving anesthesia drugs, contradicting the article. The way she describes it they open you up and cut your abdominal aorta, at which point the anesthesiologist leaves the room because you are fully dead. Then they harvest organs and tissues as fast as they can. The people bei…

Without commenting on the rest of the article: The claim being made, as I understand it, is that the anesthesiologist is there and administers drugs to paralyze but not to anesthetize. So the presence of an anesthesiologist administering drugs does not necessary contradict the claims of the article unless you wife can confirm that the drugs both paralyze and anesthetize the patient.

Re: The truth about organ donation

#29

Post by dhathorn »

Anesthesia is always used during organ harvests. Anesthesiologists treat the donor just as they would any other patient undergoing surgery. This account by a Georgia anesthesiologist rebuts many of the points made by the article, and does so much better than I would do.

http://theunderweardrawer.blogspot.com/2012/03/death-or-some...

Re: The truth about organ donation

#30

Post by dhathorn »

fr0sty wrote: post #28
SpikeGronim wrote: post #15

My wife is an operating room nurse. She sometimes participates in organ transplants. She tells me that there is an anesthesiologist present and giving anesthesia drugs, contradicting the article. The way she describes it they open you up and cut your abdominal aorta, at which point the anesthesiologist leaves the room because you are fully dead. Then they harvest organs and tissues as fast as they can. The people bei…

Without commenting on the rest of the article: The claim being made, as I understand it, is that the anesthesiologist is there and administers drugs to paralyze but not to anesthetize. So the presence of an anesthesiologist administering drugs does not necessary contradict the claims of the article unless you wife can confirm that the drugs both paralyze and anesthetize the patient.

Yes, but the original article is spreading misinformation. Anesthesia is always used during organ harvests.
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