One of our own Dopers,Padeye, just recently passed away from acute liver failure. It made me think about starting this thread, and after receiving his widow’s permission (thanks, TheLadyLion), here it is. Have any of you thought about signing an organ donor card and making your wishes known to your next of kin? I have signed my driver’s license (I think that’s the usual place for it) authorizing a hospital to use any of my organs that they deem fit after I have no use for them any more, and I have discussed my decision with my husband and my mother.
If you haven’t, and I don’t mean this in any accusatory way, why not? Do you have some reservations that we can discuss and possibly put to rest for you?
I signed mine, but it means next-to-nothing. It will inform doctors to keep you alive for harvesting if you’re alone when you get injured, but your family can do whatever they want with your body, regardless of what documents you’ve drawn up (in Illinois anyway…and I’m pretty sure most everywhere else in the U.S.). The most important part is letting family know, and letting them know how important it is to you to do it.
I signed mine and checked it off on my state ID card, and have notified my family so they know what my wishes are in the event of my death. The doctors are welcome to harvest whatever’s salvageable. Some people don’t make good donors because of age or health problems, like my mother (although she’s signed her card, too, they probably won’t use anything other than her eyes). When my cousin died of heart failure back in 2001, obviously the heart wasn’t useful, but the kidneys and etc. were transplanted. Knowing that her son helped a lot of other people was the only thing that gave my aunt any peace.
My Indiana state ID (which contains my signature) indicates that I’m a donor, and I’m confident that neither my parents nor my sweetie, Long Time First Time, would interfere with the harvesting of my organs. Of course, I’m hoping that it’ll be another 40 or 50 years before my wish is fulfilled.
Ah, the living will - that’s a good idea, too. Jim and I are about to do our will (my dad died without a will last April - I DO NOT recommend this for people who actually care about their families), and we’ll see about adding that in, too.
I got my first donor card when I was still in middle school. I had my mom and both sisters sign it as witnesses and made them all promise that they’d follow through. I trust them all to follow my wishes. I also told them all that if they had me embalmed, I come back and haunt them.
The idea feels vaguely creepy to me, but I do intend to register as soon as I get my driver’s license. I figure it might weird me out now but by the time I actually die I’ll be too dead to care.
Well, my brand-spanking new NJ Driver’s License says “ORGAN DONOR” on the bottom, so I guess I’ve got that covered. What’s this Living Will thing, and how is it different from an ordinary will?
First, IANAL, so take what I’m saying here with a grain of salt.
A living will, unlike a regular will, is a document specifying your wishes about end-of-life health care. It is not something invoked after the coroner gets your body, and certifies you dead; it is a document that protects your desires for what kinds of “drastic” health care options you want taken to keep you alive.
Basically, it covers things such as a DNR (Do Not Resucitate) Order, whether you desire to have your body considered for organ harvesting, and whether you should be kept on life-support if your prognosis is that you will never come off the life-support. It is invoked, either at your request when admitted to a hospital, or long-term care facility, or when you can no-longer make rational and informed decisions about your own health care.
With respect to organ harvesting without one many hospitals will not even consider organ harvesting unless the family brings it up themselves. Because of how emotional an issue it is for those who do want to be buried “intact,” or have their loved ones buried that way, there are many accounts of how a single nay-sayer has kept someone’s organs from being harvested, in spite of their liscence or organ donor card statement.
A quick Googling will find any number of quick Living Wills you can fill out online and print out to have notorized and stored with your family.