General
Inside America's Organ Transplant System
Updated April 23, 2025
in General
This is a great news story giving a look into the OPO (Organ Procurement Organization) side of transplant.
This is why I started volunteering with my local OPO to help understand why the wait list is so long for some and not for others. It's a complex system.
It is graphic. It does show organs. But it's a great depiction of what happens. It's also emotional but inspiring.
Also what do you think could be done to make the waitlist a shorter wait? In Southern California it's 9 years for a kidney!
I would prefer to wait longer for a better match so I could potentially take less immunosupression medications.
A Final Gift: Inside America's Organ Transplant System - CBS News
Tagged:
1 - 6 of 6 Replies
Thanks for sharing! In my experience, renal parents have a very limited understanding (if any at all!) about OPOs and their role in the transplant process. It was never explained to me at all when I was added to the Waiting List in 2012.
The process was never explained to me when I was listed in 2020. This is so informative. I had it on in the background while doing something else and now I need to rewatch and dedicate my attention to it.
I am speechless which, if you really knew me, is rare. Looking back, I am not sure if I would have wanted to know the process prior to transplant. I knew I was dying, bat-**** crazy and offered 5 livers while living in a hospital for almost a year before my liver came through. A few years later I navigate learning about this process and I am really fascinated. I would love to hear more about your volunteer work. You are and have been such an inspiration Jeanmarie. Thank you!
Watching this video was eye opening. I tried to educate myself as well as my pre transplant coordinator on the process but it’s more to it than I ever knew. Watching the organs going out to do many places. I think my liver came from Florida to Virginia. I chose a Hept C positive liver to get one quicker and all intake us one extra pill every other day. I was on the list for 9 months which I was amazed I received one so quickly. Definitely a must watch especially families who are “on the fence” on organ donation.
Very interesting @Jeanmarie. I had cirrhosis for 2 1/2 years but I was not on the list because my MELD score was low. I had multiple hemorrhages but that still kept me short of being on the list. But then 09/07/23 happened out of nowhere, I went into acute liver failure with kidney damage. Between that date n 10/01/203 my Meld Score went to the highest it could go to, 40. I was going home to wait and an esophageal hemorrhage happened right in the hospital- it happened right in front of my Sister-and they rushed me into a critical care unit and repaired the varices. If I had been home I probably would have not have made it. I was so lucky. And somehow I got so lucky again, about 2 days later a liver came through. I was told that my case was elevated because my Meld score- Measurement of End Stage Liver Disease-was at the highest end. I live in Pa n that’s how it was explained to me. I still don’t understand why it works that way or even if it’s fair.
wow. jeanmarie - thank you so very much for sharing this video. (and thank you to CBS for making it.) eye opening. inspirational. emotional. keep on living mitch!!!!