Play video

Comment | Read Comments (2)

Lori Smith with her daughter Keira

Lori Smith wakes up every day hoping she will get a new kidney.

The 34-year-old mother, from Garford, near Abingdon, is one of 67 people waiting for an organ transplant in Oxfordshire.

The statistics don't make positive reading. In the last four years, 13 people have died in the county before receiving transplants.

And doctors have warned there will be more deaths unless organ donation policy changes.

The Government wants a radical shake-up of the donor system, with people opting out of donating organs, instead of opting in.

Mrs Smith said: "I have been on the transplant waiting list for 18 months now. It is very upsetting and frustrating.

"There could have been as many as 500 suitable kidneys during that time, which were buried or cremated because their owners didn't register as organ donors, or wanted to, but did not tell their relatives."

Mrs Smith's kidneys failed after she drank contaminated water in Tunisia six years ago.

She said: "Each day I hope it will be the one I get a call telling me a donor kidney has been found.

"Six months ago, I got a call, but it turned out that the kidney they had found was damaged.

"I am lucky because I can have dialysis to keep me alive - people needing hearts and lungs cannot.

"But even so, waiting for that call rules mine and my family's life. My three-year-old daughter Keira thinks all mummies put a dialysis tube in their tummies each night."

Mrs Smith is backing planned changes which would assume that everyone wants to be a donor after their death.

At the moment, UK residents have to make their wishes known by telling their family, submitting their details to join the NHS Organ Donor Register, or carrying a donor card.

Spain has a soft' opt-out system, where even if the person has not opted-out of donation, relatives can refuse consent.

Austria has a hard' opt-out system, which means the views of relatives aren't taken into account. It quadrupled their donation rate and, by 1990, the number of kidney transplants performed was nearly equal to those on the waiting list.

Prof Peter Friend, the clinical director of the Oxford Transplant Centre, backs a soft opt-out system.

He said: "I regard the UK's position on taking advantage of organ donations as a disgrace, and we have to do something about it.

"While only about a quarter of the UK population has joined the organ donation register, we do know that a much higher proportion are in favour of donating organs, so it is a travesty when someone dies and we don't use their organs."

Prof Friend said there are more than 400 people from Oxfordshire, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Northamptonshire, Wiltshire and Gloucestershire waiting for kidney and pancreas transplants at Oxford Transplant Centre.

"In Oxfordshire, patients are waiting for years for transplants and people are dying because they are on dialysis for so long."

Oxford West and Abingdon MP Evan Harris is chairman of the All-Party Kidney Group and a member of the BMA Medical Ethics Committee.

He said: "Under an opt-out scheme, donors' real wishes will be more often respected, more lives would be saved and grieving relatives will be spared the experience of making the wrong decision at the worst time."

But not everyone is in favour of the new system.

National patient group, Patient Concern, is against a system of presumed consent, arguing that it is not up to the state to decide what becomes of people's bodies when they die.

Mrs Smith hopes 2008 will be the year she can rebuild her life.

She has been able to continue working full-time in human resources for Thames Valley Police because she is able to self-dialysise each day at home.

She said: "I'm told by my nurses that I am the only dialysis patient in the county who does this, and I do get very tired, but I am just trying to have as good a quality of life as I can."

The only living donor who could donate a kidney to Mrs Smith is her own daughter, Keira.

She said: "Of course, I could never take a kidney from my three-year-old daughter. So my only option is to keep waiting for that phone call.

"I support changes to the system but, as a mother, I can also understand just how difficult it must be to have to decide to donate a loved-one's organs.

"But speaking as someone who knows, I would urge everyone to sign up to the donor register.

"You could save someone's life."

To find out more about organ donation, call 0845 6060400 or go to www.uktransplant.org.uk

> >Give the gift of life. Join the NHS Organ Donor Register.

6:11am Monday 4th February 2008

Print

Email this

Comment

Add your comment

Name:
Email: *
Location:
**
	e.g. 123-123
Comment: Please note: All HTML tags will be ignored. Format Text:
By posting a comment, I confirm that I have read and agree to the terms of use. Comments are not moderated but we will react if anything that breaks the rules comes to our attention and we may delete inappropriate postings. Please treat other people with respect. You must not post anything that is abusive, indecent, unlawful or defamatory. Remember, you are personally liable for what you post on this site. If you wish to complain about a comment, contact us here.
* Your email address will not be displayed ** To avoid register now or login