Organ donation is one of the medical wonders of the late 20th and early 21st century. The word is used to define the process by which regenerative (as in the case of bone marrow and blood) or non regenerative ( e.g. kidney, liver) are taken from either compatible cadaveric or live human donors in order to prolong the life of a severely ill or dying human being. Although organ donations are seen by the medical community and society at large as a method of saving a life, it is not a procedure that is without moral and ethical dilemmas.
An example of an ethical dilemma surrounding the procedure is the case of rich man vs. poor man, or rather, the case of a person who can afford to buy an organ on the black market for his use, as opposed to the situation of a person who has been on the waiting list of a hospital for over 3 years already and no matching donor has been found. Would it be right for a person who can afford to order an organ from a poor nation to get an organ and have the life saving procedure while somebody who needs the donation badly sits on a waiting list for years with no donor in sight?
Or, how about the case of a prisoner who, because he is a charge of the state, gets onto a waiting list because he has ready funds available rather than a person who has no insurance but needs the same organ donation? Since the prisoner is being punished, should his health not be included in the punishment scenario? After all, he is being punished and taught a lesson. I do not believe it is proper for my tax dollars to be spent on saving the life of a prisoner with a major operation. After all, jail is not supposed to be easy, neither is it a free ride through life and the medical hazards it poses. Another ethical issue has to do with the age of the patient. Should an old patient who is say 80 years old still be put on a waiting list ahead of an 18 year old who has more potential in life? In my opinion, the young should go ahead of the elderly in the list. After all, the elderly are already in the pre departure area of life and no amount of medical care will extend what is left of their lives.
Due to the scarcity of organ donors, a problem regarding the process of organ donation has occurred. Medical science has tried to counter the problem by developing other scientific methods to regenerate organs. The most widely debated of these procedures has to do with Xenotransplantation, the use of animal organs in humans. Although man and beast share some genetic traits, this is not a safe procedure to use as there is no telling how a human system will react to an animal organ in the system. Then, there is the option of extracting necessary cells from stem cells or umbilical cord blood. But the most questionable of these procedures has to be the creation of a another baby using discarded embryos in order to donate to a sibling. I believe that this procedure is not only unethical, but also has countless moral violations as well. Nobody should be conceived and brought into this world for the sole purpose of saving a sibling or another person. If you have seen the Ewan McGregor movie entitled “The Island”, the concept of the story solely revolves around that premise, the generation of an exact DNA copy of a human being in order to harvest organs. We are not God and therefore do not have the right to meddle with creation and its purpose in any way we want to. I believe that is a crime against God and man.
After reading the week 10 case study, I felt very sad and angry about the situation Dr. Bhas found himself in while in India. Although I realize that he was limited in affectivity by the hospital rules, he should not have given the boy money and sent him on his way. had I been the doctor on the case, I would have done my best to keep him in the “casualty” room and used the money I had on my person to purchase the insulin for administration on the boy. In the event that the hospital did not have the medicine, I would have sent the runner to the nearest drugstore or hospital to buy the necessary medicine. Hospital rules be damned, I will insist on fulfilling the Hippocratic Oath that I took when I became a doctor. My sole purpose for becoming a doctor is to prolong life, and that is what I would have done even if it meant going against hospital policies. After all, my first duty is to the patient, then the hospital. Even if hospitals are a business, they are in the business of saving lives and I would always insist that anybody who needs medical care gets at least first aid treatment. Nobody should ever be turned away because every life is important regardless of age, gender, or illness.