Organ donation breakthrough collaborative: increasing organ donation through system redesign.

Virginia McBride and Jade Perdue are public health analysts in the Division of Transplantation at the Health Resources and Services Administration of the US Department of Health and Human Services in Rockville, Md. Organ donation saves lives. The use of organ transplantation to treat people with end-stage organ failure is both medically effective and cost-effective and is now considered mainstream medicine. Although some persons cannot access this treatment for the same sociological, economic, and educational reasons that they cannot access other medical treatment, most cannot gain access because the necessary ingredient—the organ—is missing. The United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) national waiting list of patients in need of an organ has nearly 90 000 names. Organ-specific waiting lists have grown so large that the mean waiting time for a kidney now exceeds 3 years. Waiting time Organ Donation Breakthrough Collaborative Increasing Organ Donation Through System Redesign CoverArticle