levels

Organ donation shows a recovery / web

Donation and transplant levels recovered after the impact of the coronavirus pandemic and so far this year more than 1,500 organ and eye transplants have been performed, of which 117 were for children under 18 years of age.

This was reported on the occasion of the National Organ Donation Day being commemorated last week in an act headed by the Minister of Health, Carla Vizzotti, who indicated that after recovering the levels of donation and transplants after the impact of the pandemic, the Last year, the historical record of donors of 2019 was reached again.

In this sense, it was detailed that so far this year 1,502 organ and cornea transplants have been performed. Thus, 776 patients on the waiting list received an organ transplant -674 from deceased donors and 102 from living donors- and 726 cornea transplants were performed.

In addition, in the first five months of 2023, 566 kidney transplants were performed: 150 liver, 35 heart, 12 lung, 7 hepatorenal, 4 pancreatic, 1 hepatointestinal, and 1 cardiorenal.

Of the total number of transplants, 117 were for children under 18 years of age.

As detailed by the Ministry of Health in a statement, these transplants were possible thanks to the completion of 641 donation processes -294 organ donation processes and 347 corneas- that were carried out throughout the national territory: Buenos Aires (160 ), Misiones (60), Autonomous City of Buenos Aires (49), Corrientes (50), Santa Fe (49), Mendoza (47), Córdoba (43), Neuquén (32), Santiago del Estero (28), Between Ríos (25), Tucumán (21), Jujuy (14), San Juan (11), Salta (12), Río Negro (10), Catamarca (7), Chaco (5), La Pampa (5), La Rioja (4), San Luis (3), Tierra del Fuego (3), Formosa (2), Chubut (1).

On the occasion, the advances in the implementation of the Procurar Program were highlighted, which was launched at the beginning of this year and proposes the creation of Hospital Units for Procurement of Organs and Tissues (Uhprot) in hospitals.

For his part, the president of Incucai remarked that the new program is one of the main strategies to shorten waiting list times together with the development of prevention measures and the promotion of care for non-communicable diseases, such as diabetes or hypertension.

Among the relatives of donors who participated in the tribute was Silvia Irigaray, the mother of Maximiliano Tasca, murdered by a policeman in the early morning of December 29, 2001.

“It is impressive how good it feels to know that we are helping another person, it eases the pain,” said Irigaray, adding that it is necessary “to talk about this issue at home, about how one can help others tomorrow.”

“22 years ago I was able to hear my son’s desire to donate, and that was and is very healing,” he shared. Also Karina Sosa, daughter of Mirta González, a donor in 2021, described the gesture of donating as “the decision to give a better life to another person”, and stated that “it is very nice to know that today there are families that can be happy thanks to the fact that she was generous in life.”

Since the sanction in 2018 of Law No. 27,447, known as Justina Law, in our country a donor is considered to be any person over 18 years of age who has expressed their affirmative will or who has not left an express record of their opposition. The affirmative or negative will towards the donation can be expressed through the Mi Argentina app, signing an act of expression in the Incucai or in the provincial ablation and implant agencies; requesting that it be recorded in the DNI.