EDMONTON – A woman with a potentially fatal liver disease says Alberta’s decision to improve the “dire condition” of organ donations gives her new hope of getting the transplant she needs to survive.
“We are on the verge now of having a system in the province that, when the day comes that I need my liver, there is likely to be one for me, and my children don’t have to face the prospect of a future without their mother,” Karen Korchinski of Edmonton said Friday.
“This day is the happiest day of my life.”
Alberta has one of the lowest organ donation rates in Canada, with about six donors for every million people.
About 75 people in the province die each year waiting for a transplant.
The government blames the province’s booming population, lack of a policy to vigorously promote organ donations and the absence of a simple yet effective way for people to register their consent to donate.
This week, Alberta proclaimed legislation to address those problems. A new agency is to co-ordinate organ donations online to make registering as a donor much easier.
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Any time someone renews a driver’s licence or government identification, he or she will be asked about consenting to be a donor. People will also be able to register themselves online.
The information will be saved in a computer database that can be quickly consulted by health professionals.
Right now, people wishing to donate need to submit a legally binding written form that is signed, dated and witnessed. They can also carry a signed universal donor card.
Korchinski said her physician told her the biggest challenge she would face in surviving her liver disease would be time spent on a waiting list for a new liver — not the transplant operation itself.
Len Webber, a Progressive Conservative MLA from Calgary, said he decided to take action when he heard Korchinski’s story. He crafted and introduced the private member’s bill that the government has adopted.
Other provinces with similar approaches, such as Ontario’s Trillium Gift of Life Network, have recorded a big jump in the number of people signing up to be an organ donor.
“I think about the Trillium system in Ontario and how their organ donation rates have increased significantly since the implementation of this agency,” Webber said. “We are certainly hoping that will happen here and it will happen here.”
Last year, Ontario reported 1,053 life-saving organ transplants, an 11 per cent increase over the previous year and the third year in a row the number of transplants went up. Organs were donated from more than 250 people.
Under Alberta’s current policy, physicians approach family members before operating on an organ donor, but finding written consent forms under tight transplant deadlines can make decisions difficult.
Alberta Health hopes having the consent information more readily available online will increase the chance of families following through with a donor’s wishes.
Ronnie Glavsie, president of Trillium, said families in Ontario have the final say when it comes to organ donations, but almost always approve after seeing that their loved one had registered a wish to donate.
“Without evidence, a family will consent about 60 per cent of the time,” Glavsie said from Toronto.
Alberta Health Minister Fred Horne said the province is working on how to deal with such potential conflicts.
Alberta’s new approach is to roll out in the spring and be fully integrated into the government’s computer system within three to five years.
A group that lobbies for transplant patients lauded the new policy.
“The sad fact is that many Albertans on organ donation wait lists die before a donor is found,” said Nancy MacDonald of the Alberta Donates Life Coalition.
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