Friday, April 14, 2000
Bill would open organ donor database
But proposal might raise privacy issues
BY Spencer Hunt
Enquirer Columbus Bureau
COLUMBUS — A bill that seeks to increase organ donations in Ohio would stretch some family and privacy issues in an effort to save lives.
The proposal by state Rep. Greg Jolivette, R-Hamilton, would create a list of organ donors that doctors could tap into any time, day or night. This registry is intended to help doctors identify donors fast, so they can send hearts, livers and kidneys to people who desperately need them.
The bill would make legal documents out of the organ donor notices that are an option on all Ohio driver's licenses, overriding the wishes of spouses or parents who do not want a loved one's organs removed. It also would open driver's license records to let a private company contact people who decide to not become donors and encourage them to reconsider.
Sherry Kembre, a West Chester schoolteacher, said the good this bill could do far outweighs any related concerns. When her husband, Harry “Dusty” Kembre, 52, died from a intra-cerebral hemorrhage in March, his heart, liver and kidneys went to four people who needed them to live.
“His heart is still pumping in someone else's body,” Ms. Kembre said. “Obviously I would like him to be benefiting from that heart, but that's not going to happen.”
David Lewis, executive director of LifeCenter, a group authorized to recover organs from Tristate donors, said there need to be more stories like Ms. Kembre's.
“In any given year (in Cincinnati) we have 100 potential donors,” Mr. Lewis said. “Each one is a precious op portunity.”
A February survey by LifeCenter showed that of nearly 80 families asked to consent to organ donation, 47 refused, including five families of people who had organ donor designations on their driver's licenses.
Families offered a wide range of reasons for refusing consent, many apparently focusing on religious or personal objections.
Forty-one Cincinnati area residents became organ donors after they died last year — down from 45 donors in 1998 and 50 in 1997. There were more than 2,000 Ohioans waiting for organs in 1999, but only 246 got transplants.
Mr. Jolivette said his bill is needed to reverse these trends.
It would let the state hire a company or not-for-profit group to create the organ donor registry and make it accessible 24 hours a day. He said doctors now have trouble identifying donors when the state Bureau of Motor Vehicles (BMV) is closed.
The bill also would let the company use BMV records to identify people who refuse to become organ donors when they renew their licenses. These people would receive letters outlining organ donation issues and a second chance to become donors.
In cases where a deceased patient has an “Ohio Organ Donor” notice on his or her driver's license, Mr. Jolivette said, they have made final decisions that must be honored.
Mr. Jolivette said the bill limits privacy concerns because it does not let the BMV release more than the last four digits of an organ donor's Social Security number. The contractor also would be barred from releasing its information to any outside party.
The idea of making drivers licenses binding caught Dr. Brad Beck by surprise. Mr. Beck is the medical adviser to Focus on the Family, a conservative Christian advocacy group based in Colorado Springs.
“As a physician this is a great idea,” he said. “I've always wondered why a driver's license (notification) didn't carry more legal weight.”
While the issue is new to Ohio, similar laws have passed in 11 states, including Kentucky and Pennsylvania. Mr. Jolivette said his bill also has the support of the BMV and the Ohio Department of Human Services, which would pay to run the new registry.
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