Prog Transplant
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Placement of central venous catheters by organ procurement coordinators to assist in obtaining blood samples or for measuring intravascular pressure is appropriate. Preparation for this role should include appropriate didactic instruction and supervised clinical experience. ⋯ Also, resources must be readily available to treat any complications. This discussion reviews methods for insertion of venous catheters placed in the femoral, internal jugular, or subclavian veins.
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Our organ procurement organization recently developed an aggressive donation after cardiac death program. Thoracic organs are rarely recovered from non-heart-beating donors. Therefore, there is concern that donation after cardiac death may affect the recovery of thoracic organs from donors not allowed to progress to brain death. ⋯ A total of 97 organs were recovered and successfully transplanted from 44 non-heart-beating donors. If all the donors who qualified to donate thoracic organs progressed to brain death and if their thoracic organs were transplantable, then 6 additional hearts and 3 pairs of lungs may have been recovered. These data demonstrate that an aggressive donation after cardiac death program contributes significantly to the organ donor pool, with a minimal impact on potential thoracic organ recovery.