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Healthy Reasoning: Give To Get

By Allan Jones
Pride Columnist

For some reason, as a community, we are not significant participants in donor programs that request organs and other body parts for transplants. We are also not heavy donors of blood.

On the other hand, we utilize a fair share of donor organs and blood. Just visit the dialysis unit in one of the many centres across Canada and you will see Black individuals in high numbers. Why?  We have high rates of diabetes and/or high blood pressure. Both conditions are the two most common situations that reduce or eliminate kidney function driving many of us to these dialysis centers, three or four times a week, to have our blood cleaned.

Some conditions that require blood transfusion, and need blood donors, include sickle cell disease, kidney disease, anemia, hemophilia and hepatitis. As a community we are affected by all the conditions mentioned, however we are disproportionally represented in two situations with our high rates of sickle cell disease and kidney disease.

Let’s look at sickle cell disease. This is a disease that is not unique to the Black community, but we have the highest rates. Blood transfusion is used as a life-saving and prophylactic treatment in sickle cell disease. Stroke can be a common occurrence in children with sickle cell disease, and these children receive chronic blood transfusions to prevent stroke recurrence. As a community are we donating enough blood? Have you ever given blood?

People with kidney disease who are on dialysis three or four times a week, can attest to the burden attached to the process. This is a burden that can be removed by getting a donated kidney.  It limits your mobility seeing that you have to be available to go to the dialysis facility three or four times, and you feel very weak and need to rest after the process. This was emphasized by Leeson Spence, a kidney transplant recipient, and former seven year dialysis patient. I spoke to the Scarborough, Ontario, resident recently, and he said dialysis is not something he would wish on his worst enemy, and described it as a “long tedious process”. Now due to a donated kidney, which he received two years ago, he has a brand new life, not tied down to the location where he gets his dialysis treatment, but free to go anywhere he wants to.

Last year 1,803 transplants were performed and more than 4,000 Canadians are waiting for an organ transplant to save their lives. Many patients remain on waiting lists. Unfortunately, 195 Canadians died while waiting for an organ transplant. Three-quarters of the patients on the list are waiting for a kidney transplant, and I am sure many of this number are people of African heritage.

As a community we need to put back into the system that is helping us. We need to start thinking seriously about organ, tissue donation, blood and bone marrow donation. However there are a number of myths circulating that is preventing organ donation. A common one is if doctors see your signed donor card they will not work as hard to save your life. Please recognize that doctors who care for seriously injured patients are not involved with the transplant process. Their only concern is to save lives. Organ donation is only considered after all attempts to save your life have failed, death has been declared, and your family has been consulted regarding your wishes.

If you want to have tissue or organs donated, please talk to your doctor, or sign the tissue or organ donation card, and let your family know your wishes. Millions of people in Ontario are walking around with signed organ-donor cards in their purses and wallets, confident they might ultimately give the gift of life. However in the cases where organ and tissue donation is possible, medical staffs in emergency departments and intensive care units do not have the time to go rummaging around in search of donor cards. Instead, they approach the family and ask consent for the donation, so it is important to let your family know your wishes.

A donated kidney can result in a happy recipient like Leeson Spence. Giving blood can provide for a child with sickle cell disease and minimize the possibility of that child having a stroke. And there are many other examples and situation I could mention.

Let us contribute to a system that helps our community in significant ways. Let us give, so we can continue to get.

Allan Jones is a Health Promoter and Broadcaster. He can be reached at ajones@jjmedical.ca.

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