Direct donation received from family members or friends, non-direct donation involving a donor giving their organs to a general pool for the recipient who is on top of the waiting list and
directed donation to a stranger where a donor chooses a specific stranger to give their organ to.
Recent AMA policy notes the controversy surrounding solicitation for
directed donation, but also recognizes that there may not be an ethical problem if a system of solicitation increases the total number of organs available while not reasonably disadvantaging those on the waiting list.
Federal law permits
directed donation. LifeSharers members use a form of
directed donation that is legal under federal law (and the laws of all 50 states) to offer their organs first to other registered organ donors.
Directed donation means a donor family can designate where their loved one's organs can go and to whom they may go.
shows how addressing a concrete problem--whether to allow "socially
directed donation"--can lead to a new conception of theoretical justice.
Indeed, in an abstract presented at the AABB meeting in 1988 by Chambers and coworkers, "Directed Donor Program May Adversely Affect Autologous Donor Participation," 100 active autologous donors were surveyed.|9~ Of 95 respondents, 75 understood that autologous blood is safer than directed blood; 21 felt that autologous and directed blood were equally safe; and 19 of 100 active autologous donors indicated that they would have preferred
directed donation if it had been made available.
In response to a comment made by a living donor advocacy organization that OPTN policies should not interfere with the right of an altruistic living donor's right to direct the donation, HRSA agreed and directed the OPTN to develop living donor allocations policies that include right to
directed donation.
(Other nations, notably Mexico and China, restrict
directed donations to family members, reflecting a concern that transplants between donors and recipients who are not related may conceal organ sales.) Once we accept
directed donation in principle, distinguishing between genuine friendships and "friendships" developed solely for the purpose of organ donation is impractical.
You can also send a
directed donation via text that includes the name of the community in which you want the funds to be used.
That a third adolescent patient was also awaiting a donor heart at that institution only highlights concerns about
directed donation.
The effort included hold a rally in Union Square, setting up a Web site seeking a
directed donation, and even trying to track down critically ill trauma victims, the New York Daily News reported.
While 74 percent of the respondents indicated that organs should be allocated to "whoever needs them" 24 percent indicated their "strong preference" was that organs be given only to "members of a particular ethnic, racial, religious, or other group of the respondent's wishes." Altogether, 65.6 percent of the respondents indicated at least a "2," or moderate preference, for this form of "
directed donation" by group characteristics.