More than 400 donor family members, 150 deceased donors, and 15 living donors were recognized for their gifts at the 10th Annual National Donor Recognition Ceremony and Workshop, held July 20-22 in Washington, D.C.

The ceremony is held every other year to thank organ and tissue donors across America and raise public awareness of the critical need for donation.

Sunday’s ceremony honoring the donors concluded the weekend, which is sponsored by HRSA, the National Donor Family Council and other transplant organizations.

HRSA Administrator Betty Duke addressed the group, relating her personal experience of donating her first husband’s corneas after he lost his 10-year battle with cancer. “It gave me great comfort and peace to know that I honored his wishes to be a donor,” she said.

Participants at the Recognition Ceremony comfort each other.

Patrick Pruitt, a 23-year-old who received a cornea transplant when he was six years old, also spoke, telling the audience that he intends to use his “phenomenal gift” to the fullest. Today, Patrick is studying neuropsychology and has worked as an advocate for youth in the criminal justice system. “Everything I’ve seen over the past 17 years is the gift you gave to me, and I try to use my sight and life to touch the lives of others and make the world better,” he said. Stephen Sprague, a cord blood recipient, and Virna Elly, a kidney/pancreas recipient, also shared moving stories about how transplants had changed their lives.

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HRSA’s Global Influence on Donation

Donation proponents in other countries have begun to use HRSA’s Organ Donation Breakthrough Collaborative as a model to boost donation rates.

In Australia, the year-old National Organ Donation Collaborative, following HRSA’s example, has helped spark a 39 percent increase in donation in participating hospitals and a 25 percent increase in donation nationally.

Dennis Wagner, former director of the HRSA’s Organ Donation Breakthrough Collaborative and now deputy director of the Center for Quality, traveled in June to Australia to meet with health officials and explain the Collaborative’s impact on donation in the United States.

In Canada, teams from hospitals and organ procurement organizations in Quebec and Ontario have been attending HRSA-sponsored Collaborative events in the United States for years. Two Canadian hospitals were honored at last year’s Second National Learning Congress on Organ Donation and Transplantation for their success in meeting the goals of a second initiative, the Organ Transplantation Breakthrough Collaborative launched in May 2005. The second Collaborative seeks to increase the average number of organs transplanted per donor to 3.75 or more, up from an average of about three organs transplanted per donor in 2004.

Also in Canada, educators in the provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba asked for and received permission from HRSA to use Decision: Donation for use in high school driver’s education courses there. The HHS-produced educational material encourages students and teachers to consider the need for donated organs and the impact their own donation decision can make on the lives of others. And recently a doctor from Poland contacted Division of Transplantation staff through the HRSA Information Center to ask permission to translate Decision: Donation for use in local schools.