Irish medical journal
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Irish medical journal · Mar 2004
Brain death and organ donation: an audit in the Irish National Transplantation and Neurosurgical Centre.
We set out to identify the reasons why potential organ donors (PODs) fail to become actual donors and the causes of under-utilization of organs offered for donation. We audited 354 patients who died in the intensive Care Unit over 18 months. Of 155 PODs, 78 (50%) did not undergo brain stem testing (BST) because of (i) unavoidable death from non-CNS causes before BST (n = 50), (ii) treatment withdrawal without BST (n = 17) and (iii) preconditions for BST were not fulfilled (n = 11). ⋯ The commonest reason for failure to utilise potential organ donors was failure to perform BST. In most cases this was because BSTs were not possible but more aggressive management of and the routine performance of BST in all PODs could increase the number of donors. Not approaching relatives to ask consent for organ donation and a high rate of refusal by relatives also led to loss of organ donors.