Organ Donation

Pennsylvania is poised to become the first state in the country to offer financial rewards - in the form of $300 contributions toward funeral expenses - to the families of organ donors. "This is quite controversial," said Kevin Sparkman of the Delaware Valley Transplant Program, the organ procurement organization that oversees donations in Southeastern Pennsylvania, South Jersey and Delaware. "Until now, we have always depended strictly on altruism to drive organ donation. " The three-year pilot program, scheduled to begin as early as September, will be run by the state Department of Health and funded with donations from Pennsylvanians renewing their driver's licenses, Sparkman said.

Walter Ross' arms are scarred, the ragged lines that run from his wrists to his shoulders the proof of all he has endured. Four years ago, sudden kidney failure put him on dialysis, requiring him to undergo the blood-cleaning procedure three times a week. His body has already rejected one transplant. Now he's hoping for a new organ to spare him the fate of his mother and sister, who both died of renal failure. The 51-year-old father of two isn't waiting quietly. Last week, he joined about 40 African American volunteers, mostly relatives of organ recipients and donors, who traversed the state on a Philadelphia-to-Pittsburgh Barnstorming Bus Tour to raise awareness about organ donation.

Tom Speck has never met the family members who donated the heart that saved his little girl's life. But he can't get them out of his mind. "I just want to reach out and say thank you to everyone for having - in your worst hour - the strength and gracious heart to want to reach out and help someone else," said Speck, whose 8-year-old Melissa was on the verge of death when she underwent a heart transplant last year. Grieving audience members quietly wept as Speck choked back tears during a ceremony yesterday honoring the families of organ donors.

Over the years, we have watched the media focus on patients who wait for life-saving organ transplants. The public has heard about the men, women and children who wait for two to three years for kidney transplants or the patients who have died while awaiting life-saving heart and liver transplants. But rarely do we hear about the patients who are placed on the transplant waiting list and the very next day or shortly thereafter receive a new organ - at least not until Gov. Casey received his double transplant this week.

Following a concerted effort by New Jersey's Motor Vehicle Commission to ask every customer about organ donation, the number of registered donors in the state shot up last year. The number of people who registered as donors at MVC offices rose from 626,857 in 2011 to 713,702 in 2012, up 14 percent. In total, the number of registered donors in New Jersey went up by 4.5 percent during that time period to 2.4 million. The numbers were highlighted Thursday at a news conference at Our Lady of Lourdes Medical Center in Camden, which performs organ transplants.

In our region, 6,500 critically ill residents wait for organs, kidneys, livers, hearts. After a notable 8.6 percent decline last year, local organ donations have increased - March was a banner month - but not enough if you ask anyone who has been waiting and waiting, an average of five years for a healthy kidney. In 1994, Pennsylvania became one of the first states to list organ donation on driver's licenses. The region is a mecca with eight surgical centers performing transplants.

Anthony Yeni has a new liver and a new purpose. "Before, I didn't know why I had been given a second chance," the Cherry Hill resident said. "Now, I know it's to go out to speak and educate. " Yeni's drive is common among organ recipients, and many of them are out this weekend - Donor Sabbath Weekend - speaking for what they call "the gift of life. " The message is going out in hundreds of sanctuaries across the country in an effort to raise awareness of organ donation and reassure worshipers that they don't need their organs to make it to heaven.

Even before Sister Kathleenjoy Cooper grips her paddle in a table tennis match at this weekend's U.S. Transplant Games in Indianapolis, she knows she has already won a lifelong prize - a kidney. Sister Cooper of Haverford is one of 50 Delaware Valley contestants who will compete with about 450 other athletes - all transplant recipients - in Olympic-style games organized by the National Kidney Foundation Inc. and Sandoz Pharmaceutical Corp. The event is the first nationally organized counterpart to the International Transplant Games, slated for Budapest, Hungary, next year.

Officials at Mercy Suburban Hospital said the accused double murderer who hanged himself in a Montgomery County prison is brain dead. However, Chang Qi - charged with fatally stabbing the wife and 8-year old son of a former employer on May 9 - remains on life support. "He is brain dead. He's in grave condition," said Sonya Evans-Johnson, spokeswoman for the East Norriton hospital. She declined comment on whether he was being kept on life support for purposes of organ donation. Prison guards found Qi hanging from a shower rod in his cell in the prison's medical wing at about 1 a.m. on Wednesday.

Innovative methods that would increase the number of human organs available for transplants in the future were the center of discussion yesterday at the regional conference of the National Kidney Foundation at the Sheraton Society Hill. Financial incentives for organ donors and the routine "harvesting" of organs from dead people unless survivors specifically object were among the controversial topics aired. The conference was called to examine innovative approaches to a problem that worsens daily.