Lifeline of Ohio is one of four organ procurement organizations (OPOs) in the state of Ohio designated by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services of the United States Department of Health and Human Services to facilitate organ and tissue donation. [1] As a licensed tissue bank, Lifeline of Ohio's tissue recovery services are regulated by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). [2] [3] Lifeline of Ohio is also a member of the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS), a government-chartered nationwide network operating under the United States Department of Health and Human Services. [4]
Accredited by the American Association of Tissue Banks [5] and the Association of Organ Procurement Organizations, Lifeline of Ohio serves 37 counties in central and southeastern Ohio along with Wood and Hancock counties in West Virginia. Lifeline of Ohio has both clinical and non-clinical staff who promote and coordinate organ and tissue donation. [4]
Organ donation is the process when a person authorizes an organ of their own to be removed and transplanted to another person, legally, either by consent while the donor is alive, through a legal authorization for deceased donation made prior to death, or for deceased donations through the authorization by the legal next of kin.
Organ transplantation is a medical procedure in which an organ is removed from one body and placed in the body of a recipient, to replace a damaged or missing organ. The donor and recipient may be at the same location, or organs may be transported from a donor site to another location. Organs and/or tissues that are transplanted within the same person's body are called autografts. Transplants that are recently performed between two subjects of the same species are called allografts. Allografts can either be from a living or cadaveric source.
AABB is an international, not-for-profit organization representing individuals and institutions involved in the field of transfusion medicine and biotherapies.
The Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) is an agency of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services located in North Bethesda, Maryland. It is the primary federal agency for improving access to health care services for people who are uninsured, isolated or medically vulnerable.
Eye banks recover, prepare and deliver donated eyes for cornea transplants and research. The first successful cornea transplant was performed in 1905 and the first eye bank was founded in 1944. Currently, in the United States, eye banks provide tissue for over 80,000 cornea transplants each year to treat conditions such as keratoconus and corneal scarring. In some cases, the white of the eye (sclera) is used to surgically repair recipient eyes. Unlike other organs and tissues, corneas are in adequate supply for transplants in the United States, and excess tissue is exported internationally, where there are shortages in many countries, due to greater demand and a less-developed eye banking infrastructure.
The Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments (CLIA) of 1988 are United States federal regulatory standards that apply to all clinical laboratory testing performed on humans in the United States, except clinical trials and basic research.
Body donation, anatomical donation, or body bequest is the donation of a whole body after death for research and education. There is usually no cost to donate a body to science; donation programs will often provide a stipend and/or cover the cost of cremation or burial once a donated cadaver has served its purpose and is returned to the family for interment.
The United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) is a non-profit scientific and educational organization that administers the only Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network (OPTN) in the United States, established by the U.S. Congress in 1984 by Gene A. Pierce, founder of United Network for Organ Sharing. Located in Richmond, Virginia, the organization's headquarters are situated near the intersection of Interstate 95 and Interstate 64 in the Virginia BioTechnology Research Park.
A tissue bank is an establishment that collects and recovers human cadaver tissue for the purposes of medical research, education and allograft transplantation. A tissue bank may also refer to a location where biomedical tissue is stored under cryogenic conditions and is generally used in a more clinical sense.
Organ procurement is a surgical procedure that removes organs or tissues for reuse, typically for organ transplantation.
The National Organ Transplant Act (NOTA) of 1984 is an Act of the United States Congress that created the framework for the organ transplant system in the country. The act provided clarity on the property rights of human organs obtained from deceased individuals and established a public-private partnership known as Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network (OPTN). The OPTN was given the authority to oversee the national distribution of organs.
The Healthcare Systems Bureau is part of the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), of the United States Department of Health and Human Services.
The American Association of Tissue Banks (AATB) is a nonprofit transplant trade organization that is dedicated to ensuring that human tissues intended for transplantation are safe and free of infectious disease, of uniform high quality, and available in quantities sufficient to meet national needs. AATB is located in McLean, Virginia. It was founded in 1976 and consists of 1,100 members.
Newark Beth Israel Medical Center (NBIMC), previously Newark Beth Israel Hospital, is a 665-bed quaternary care, teaching hospital located in Newark, New Jersey serving the healthcare needs for Newark and the Northern Jersey area. The hospital is owned by the RWJBarnabas Health System and is the third-largest hospital in the system.
Francis L. Delmonico, MD, FACS is an American surgeon, clinical professor and health expert in the field of transplantation. He serves on numerous committees and is affiliated with various leading organizations and institutions. He is the chief medical officer of the New England Organ Bank (NEOB) and Professor of Surgery, Part-Time at Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts, where he is emeritus director of renal transplantation. He served as president of The Transplantation Society (TTS) from 2012 to 2014, an international non-profit organization based in Montreal, Canada that works with international transplantation physicians and researchers. He also served as the president of the United Network of Organ Sharing (UNOS) in 2005, which overseas the practice of organ donation and transplantation in the United States. He was appointed and still serves as an advisor to the World Health Organization in matters of organ donation and transplantation. He was appointed by Pope Francis to the Pontifical Academy of Science in 2016. In 2020, he became the recipient of the Medawar Prize of The Transplantation Society.
The Final Rule is a national policy in the United States that dictates the protocol for all cadaveric organ donation. The Final Rule replaced a variety of local and regional protocols with a unified policy for the first time. It also increased the Department of Health and Human Services' control of organ donation.
In the United States, an organ procurement organization (OPO) is a non-profit organization that is responsible for the evaluation and procurement of deceased-donor organs for organ transplantation. There are 57 such organizations in the United States, each responsible for organ procurement in a specific region, and each a member of the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network (OPTN), a federally-mandated network managed by the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) under federal contract. The individual OPOs represent the front line of organ procurement, having direct contact with the donor's hospital and the family of the recently deceased donor. Once the OPO receives authorization for donation from the decedent's family or through first-person authorization, it works with UNOS to identify the best candidates for the available organs, and coordinates with the surgical team for each organ recipient.
The HIV Organ Policy Equity Act is a law that modifies rules regarding organ donation between HIV-positive individuals. The law authorizes clinical research and the revision of rules about organ donation and transportation as a result of the research. Organs from HIV donors would only be going to individuals who are already HIV positive, but could lead to 600 additional organ transplants a year. The use of HIV-positive organs was previously a federal crime. This bill passed the United States Senate during the 113th United States Congress, and also passed the United States House of Representatives. It was signed into law as PL 113-51 by President Barack Obama on November 21, 2013.
Transplant coordinator is a healthcare professional – doctor, nurse, or allied health science graduate – who coordinates activities related to organ donation and transplantation. Transplant coordinators can either be Donor Coordinators or Recipient Coordinators.
J. Michael Henderson is an American general and transplant surgeon, with experience in portal hypertension, liver transplantation, and pancreatic disease. Henderson is the Chief Medical Officer at the University of Mississippi Medical Center since 2015. Prior to this role, he was with the Cleveland Clinic from 1992–2014. He was the Chairman of the Department of General Surgery and Director of the Transplant Center for 12 years, and was the Chief Quality Officer for the Cleveland Clinic’s 10-hospital system for eight years.