Donors need to inform family members to facilitate organ transplantation

PUTRAJAYA: People who have pledged to donate their organs have been advised to inform their family members to facilitate the process of organ transplantation after their death.
Deputy Minister of Health, Datuk Seri Dr Hilmi Yahaya said although they had pledged to donate the organs, the hospitals still need the agreement of family members.
"In Malaysia, the organ donation rate after death is only 1.0 per million population (PMP) compared to South Korea with 9.96 PMP, United Kingdom with 21 PMP and Spain with 39.7 PMP," he told a press conference in conjunction with the closing ceremony of the Organ Donation Forum, here, today.
As of Aug 31, some 394,809 people had registered as organ donors comprising Chinese (40.34%), Malays (30.61%), Indians (22.79%) and others (6.27%).
However, the actual number of organ donors after death was much smaller, with only 620 since the programme was launched in 1975.

"This gap is significant compared to the number of patients suffering from organ failure and need to undergo organ transplantation," said Hilmi.
As of Aug 31, more than 21,000 patients were on the waiting list with the majority being kidney failure patients followed by liver, heart and lung.
Since 1975, a total of 2,047 organ transplantation surgeries were conducted involving Kuala Lumpur Hospital, Selayang Hospital and the National Heart Institute.
Organ transplantation is indispensable for kidney patients where the cost of haemodialysis per patient per year is about RM40,000 compared to the cost of kidney transplantation of RM30,000. — Bernama