By Kaitlyn Schaeffer
Gillian Bennet took her own life on August 18th of this year by ingesting a fatal dose of Nembutal on a cliff near her home. Ms. Bennet had previously been diagnosed with dementia, and in an effort to avoid a “long and terrifying descent” into this mysterious disease, she opted to take matters into her own hands. The act and the blog she wrote (Dead at Noon) detailing …

By Zoe Siegel
President Reagan signed the National Organ Transplant Act (NOTA) 30 years ago. It was hoped that NOTA would end organ shortages by instituting legal guidelines for the transplantation of organs. However, approximately 30 Americans are removed from waiting lists every day because they become too sick to receive transplants or because they perish.
One possible solution to this problem lies in implementing the European model of presumed consent in the …

By Abrigul Lutfalieva
Recently, a Swedish mother became the first woman to successfully give live birth after receiving a womb transplant. The baby boy was born prematurely, but he is healthy and doing well.
Six months after receiving the transplant, the patient got her menstrual period, indicating that the womb was functioning properly.
Dr. Mats Brannstrom, the gynocologist heading up the research team and the doctor who delivered the baby, declared that it …

By Caroline Song
NBCnews.com has recently published an article titled “Bioethicist: Why Brittany Maynard Changes the Right-to-Die Debate” by Arthur Caplan. Maynard has recently been highlighted in the media due to her controversial decision to end her own life after being diagnosed at the age of 29 with a grade four glioblastoma multiform, an aggressive and lethal form of brain cancer.  Maynard was given a timeline of six months to live. …

By Andrew Rock
Many people making end-of-life arrangements consider donating their body to science. It is an option often lauded as practical and useful to society. However, those seeking to do so may face more obstacles than one would expect, according to a family of a recently deceased donor.
Ralph Ward had always wanted to donate his body to medical science. “[He] felt that training a new doctor would be a gift …

By Asha Persad
The University of Barcelona has taken the lead in implementing a new project, called the European-Mediterranean Postgraduate Program on Organ Donation and Transplantation (EMPODaT), a postgraduate program that promotes the initiation of organ donation and transplantation in Egypt, Lebanon and Morocco. The objective of the program is to develop an academic curriculum where students will be trained to become specialists in organ donation and transplantation.
Statistics have shown that …

By Zoe Martina Siegel
Recently, a campaign in Canada has been pushing for an opt-out system for organ donation – under such a policy, consent is presumed unless an individual has specifically opted out. Bill Barrable, who was the chief executive officer of British Columbia Transplant from 1994 through 2009, has recently voiced his concern about presumed consent policy.
His research has revealed that, of those countries with presumed consent laws, only three …

By Amy Xia
Transparency Market Research recently published an analysis of the steadily growing organ preservation solutions market.
The organ preservation solutions market plays a large role in procuring organs. Organ preservation techniques allow organs to be kept and protected once they have been removed from the human body. The preserved organs can then be used for transplants or research.
The two main techniques of organ preservation are hypothermic perfusion preservation (HPP) and …

By Caroline Song
Healthcare professionals Network Live, HCPLive, recently published a piece by Gale Scott, on the current debate on the organ distribution process in the United States. The article titled, “Hot Debate on Organ Distribution Proposal” contained coverage from a forum held by the United Network for Organ Sharing, UNOS. The main point of contention circled around the disparity in organ distribution. For instance, in some states patients can move …

By Abrigul Lutfalieva
Pennsylvania legislators are currently considering two organ-transplant bills. If passed, Senate Bill 850 and House Bill 30 (which are basically identical according to their supporters) are expected to increase the number of organ donors. But a (hopefully unexpected) side-effect is that it might be “easier for murderers to avoid detection and prosecution.”
Currently, there are 121,000 people on the national waitlist for organ transplants. Generally, laws that stand to …