Legal Issues Related To Payment For Donation
The National Organ Transplantation Act of 1984 specifically prohibits the exchange of “valuable consideration” for a human organ .
Therefore, it is illegal to sell organs; if this occurs, it is punishable by fines, imprisonment, or both.
However, the payment of “the expenses of travel, housing, and lost wages incurred by the donor of a human organ in connection with the donation of the organ” is expressly permitted by section 301 of NOTA.
Learn more about the;National Organ Transplantation Act;.
What Happens Before A Kidney Transplant
If your child needs a kidney transplant, your first step is to visit a transplant center. The health care team will check to make sure that your child is healthy enough to have surgery and take the medicines needed after the transplant. This will include blood tests, X-rays, and other tests, and can take a few weeks or months.
If the transplant team decides your child is a good candidate, the next step is to find a kidney. In most cases for living donor transplants, a kidney comes from a close relative or friend who has a compatible blood type.
If a living donor isn’t found, your child’s name will go on a waiting list until a kidney from a deceased donor is matched to your child. The need for new kidneys is far greater than the number donated, so this can take a long time.
You’ll stay in close touch with the doctors and the rest of the health care team. Make sure they know how to reach you at all times. When a kidney is located, you’ll need to go to the transplant center at a moment’s notice.
While you wait for a transplant, keep your child as healthy as possible. That way, he or she will be ready for transplant surgery when the time comes. Help your child:
- eat healthy foods and follow any special diet recommendations from the doctor, nurse, or dietitian
- take all medicines as directed
- keep all medical appointments
Tell your doctor and the transplant center right away if is any change in your child’s health.
Will My Child Grow Normally
The kidneys play an important role in a childs growth, so children with kidney disease may not grow as well as their peers. To make the problem worse, their illness can make them feel sick, alter their sense of taste and reduce their appetite.
How to help
Its important to make sure that children with kidney disease get enough nutrition. Talk to your childs doctor about ways to help boost growth. Taking supplements and limiting certain foods while eating more fats and carbohydrates to increase calorie intake can help. Some children benefit from injections of growth hormone.
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What Is A Kidney Transplant
Kidneys are vital organs that filter blood to remove waste, extra fluid, and salt from the body. If they stop working, it’s called kidney failure. Someone with kidney failure must go on or get a kidney transplant.
A kidney transplant is an operation where doctors put a new kidney in the body of someone whose own kidneys no longer work. One healthy kidney will do the work of two failed kidneys.
Because people can survive with just one kidney, a living person can give a healthy kidney to someone with kidney failure. This is called being a donor. A kidney also can come from a donor who has recently died, but the wait for this kind of donated kidney can take a year or more.
Most kidney transplants are successful. People who have kidney transplants will take medicines for the rest of their lives to prevent the body from rejecting the kidney. Rejecting means that the body’s immune cells destroy the new kidney because they sense that it’s foreign.
But aside from that, many kids and teens who have kidney transplants go on to live normal, healthy lives after they recover from surgery.
In Quebec Children In Need Of Kidney Transplants Are Given Priority On Organ Donation Waiting Lists Until The Age Of 18 Years
However, once patients turn 18, they can wait years for a potential donor. It is therefore important to not just think about registering but actually doing it if you decide to become an organ and tissue donor. Its also important to talk to your family about your wishes so they understand and accept your decision.
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Risks And Benefits Of Living Kidney Donation
People who are considering becoming a kidney donor must carefully weigh the potential risks and benefits of donating a kidney.
Although the surgery itself is often a major component of this decision, other factors such as medical risks, the cosmetic result, and socioeconomic factors also play an important role in the decision-making process, as described in detail in this section.
Where Can I Find Statistics Related To Living Donation
You can find some statistics on the United Network for Organ Sharing web site. UNOS compiles statistics on every transplant center in the United States. To view all UNOS data, . You can find statistics on the number of non-living and living donor transplants performed at that particular center, respectively, and the graft survival rates for the transplant recipient.
The best source of information on expected donor outcomes is from your transplant team. Talk with them about general risks including long and short term, as well as any specific concerns you have regarding your personal health status.
for detailed statistics on short-term complications from living donation .
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What Are The Different Types Of Kidney Transplants
There are two kinds of kidney transplants depending on who donates the new kidney.
A living-donor transplant is when someone gets a kidney from a person who is still alive and well. It’s usually from a relative or close friend, but sometimes strangers donate.
A is when people donate their kidneys for transplant after they die. This requires people who need kidneys to put their names on a waiting list until a donor is found.
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How Long Could You Be Separated From Your Child
As a kidney donor you will need time to recover from the immediate effects of the surgery. This is dependent upon the type of operation you have and your individual recovery. You will be anxious to see your child but it is also important that you rest as much as possible in the first few days to help your recovery.
You will be able to stay in touch by telephone and family members and friends will be able to visit both of you. If you are in separate hospitals, you will be able to see your child once you have been discharged home.
The staff caring for both you and your child realise how important it is that contact is maintained and if you are operated on in the same hospital, they will bring you to visit your child;as soon as you are able.
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If I Am Selected As A Kidney Donor How Long Will The Recovery Period Be
LPCH has been a leader in the use of what is known as minimal-incision nephrectomy . The incision is only 3 inches long, about one-third the length of the standard open-incision nephrectomy. This approach also eliminates the additional smaller incisions used in nephrectomy via laparoscope. Not only does the donor recover faster with the minimal-incision nephrectomy. Donor kidneys transplanted with this technique function more quickly in the recipient than do kidneys removed with the laparoscopic approach.
How Can I Help My Child
Having a chronic condition can be hard for kids. Dialysis, surgery, and immunosuppressant therapy can add to the stress. Talk to your child about these changes and how you will work them into your routine. Make sure to find time to do fun things together with family and friends.
For teens, immunosuppressant therapy can be a challenge. These medicines can cause:
- getting acne or having acne that gets worse
- weight gain
- problems with increased blood sugars , sometimes requiring insulin
- high blood pressure
- increased risk of infection
These side effects are a major reason why teens are at risk for not taking their medicines after a transplant. This can be dangerous and even lead to rejection of the new kidney. Do not change or stop any medicines without talking to your doctor or nurse. In some cases, medicines can be changed to ease the side effects and still be effective and safe. Talk to about the importance of taking all medicines as directed, and help your child to do so.
To help:
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Is It Okay For A Child Donate A Kidney To Their Parent
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A: There Are Many Factors To Think About When Considering Organ Donation Both For The Person Receiving The Graft And The Person Donating A Kidney
While its true that a parent is often the ideal candidate to donate a kidney to their child, there may be reasons that make organ donation difficult or impossible.
First, there may be medical reasons that prevent a parent from donating a kidney. A parent may want nothing more than to give their child a healthy kidney but if they are not a compatible match medicallyeither because of blood type, antibodies of the recipient against the donor tissue, or an underlying health condition that would prevent them from being able to donate an organthen they cant consider it further.
The second reason preventing a parent from donating their kidney could be financial. A kidney transplant operation requires a donor to recover at home for a few weeks after surgery, which can impose a financial burden on some families if the potential donor is the sole income earner.
A third potential reason parents may not be able to donate a kidney to their child could be due to personal reasons. The decision to donate is not easy to make. Each person has a unique set of circumstances that will affect his or her decision.
Donating a kidney to their child is probably one of the most difficult and important choices a parent could ever face. For parents considering this option, the childs healthcare team can play an important role in providing information and advice to help them make their decision.
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Is There A Downside To A Kidney From An Older Donor
When studies have compared older kidneys — those from people over age 50 or even over age 70 — to kidneys from younger donors, they’ve found some minor differences.
Kidneys from younger donors seem to work better over the long term. But people who get older kidneys are just as likely to be alive 5 years after a transplant as those that receive younger kidneys. Plus, the chances of complications from the procedure, and of organ rejection — when someone’s immune system attacks their new kidney — are the same with kidneys from all age groups.
The takeaway from these studies is that kidneys from older donors can work, but younger people in need of a kidney may want to consider being matched with younger donors.
How Do I Find Out If Its Safe For Me To Donate A Kidney
Here at UT Southwestern, the first step in our potential donor screening process is a kidney donation application. This application allows a wider net of potential donors to participate, even if they live across the country from the recipient.
A relatively healthy person in his or her 30s to 50s likely will fly through the form. The application asks for basic health details, such as age, height, and weight. We also ask for personal medical history, particularly pertaining to diseases that could lead to kidney problems down the road, such as:
- AIDS/HIV
- Smoking or vaping
- Urinary problems
Individuals with a history of these diseases might be screened out immediately. If theres a high risk that a potential donor might develop kidney problems later in life, giving up a kidney today is not a healthy choice.
Obesity and smoking can be exceptions for some potential donors because these risk factors sometimes can be reversed. Smokers and vapers can quit with help from their doctor and might be able to reapply, depending on their overall health.
We actually see return applicants fairly often. It can be tough for someone to quit smoking or lose weight, but saving the life of another person is pretty great motivation!
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What Happens During A Kidney Transplant
The doctors will take a blood sample so they can do an antibody cross-match test. This is done to find out if your child’s immune system will accept the new kidney. If the test comes back negative, the kidney is acceptable. Other blood test and imaging studies are done before the transplant.
In the operating room, your child will get general anesthesia to sleep through the operation. Then the surgeon makes a small cut in the lower belly, just above your child’s hips. The new kidney is placed, and the surgeon attaches its blood vessels to blood vessels in the lower body. Then the new kidney’s is connected to the bladder.
In most cases, the old kidneys stay in place. Failed kidneys aren’t removed unless they cause problems like high blood pressure or an infection. Kidney transplant surgery usually takes about 3 to 4 hours.;If your child needs more than one organ , the surgery time will be longer.
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Donating A Kidney To A Family Member Can Dredge Up Some Knotty Emotional Issues
Families are complicated, and they get even more so when you go through the kidney donation process.
The transplant center understands this, which is why early in the process, they tell you that if you decide against giving, the recipient would never know that was your decision. Instead, they would just be informed that you did not qualify as a match.
The role of the spouse is also incredibly hard. Meghan has a good relationship with my parents, but our family and our kids are her priority. My mom, sister, and brother were all of the same mindset: Dad is sick. How do we help him? Meghan was thinking something else: What is best for our young family, and are we putting all that at risk? I was in the middle weighing both.
And it was harder for her than for me. She had a veto: If she was strongly opposed, the panel would not have approved the surgery and my parents would never know. But what would that have done to our marriage, especially as my father got sicker? The spouse has a choice but they dont really. Meghan had her reservations, but to her credit, she never once in the entire process said no.
I had to accept that I was doing this because it was the right thing to do, and that it would not magically turn my parents into people they were not. I made this observation to the social worker, who said this was quite common. We like to say we specialize in kidney transplants, not personality transplants, she said.
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Recovery In The Hospital
- Before your child can go home, the transplant team will continue to provide care in the hospital for about one week, though sometimes a longer hospital stay is needed.
- While in the hospital, your child may have blood tests to check on their new kidney, and given medicines to help with pain.
- The nurse will help your child walk everyday , and coach your child through deep breathing exercises needed for healing.
- Some children may need to go on dialysis briefly after the transplant before their new kidney starts working fully. This doesnt mean the kidney is a bad one; it just needs a bit more time to start working. This is more likely to happen if your child got a kidney from a deceased donor.
- Before your child leaves the hospital, transplant team members will talk with you, your child, and family members about caring for your child, and the importance of properly taking their medicines to keep their new kidney healthy.
Can My Child Be An Organ Donor What Parents Should Know
Young organ donors offer a key lifeline to other sick children in need. But misconception and fear can cloud the idea of donation, a new poll has found.
Many adults know the lifesaving value of organ donation. Millions of American adults have committed to help others in the event of their deaths.
But what about children?
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Families must consent to donate those organs, says John Magee, M.D., section head of transplant surgery and surgical director of Pediatric Liver & Kidney Transplantation. But parents, even if registered as donors themselves, often find the decision tough after a devastating loss.
It can be a difficult conversation, but organ donation should be a norm for everyone, says Magee. Its often the only good thing that comes from an inconceivable tragedy.
That mindset, however, isnt reflected in the latest C.S. Mott Childrens Hospital National Poll on Childrens Health. The nationwide survey of 2,005 parents found that only 17 percent of those with children ages 14 and younger have interest in learning more about pediatric organ donation.
Of parents with teens, just 1 in 4 poll respondents said their new drivers had registered to be organ donors when receiving their drivers license.
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