An important question is: How long should the cardiac arrest last so that the organs can be removed? The FDP is not making any proposals on this. That’s why the Society for Cardiology explains: “Unfortunately, at this point in time, we don’t know enough about the FDP’s proposal to be able to comment on it in a well-founded manner.” As soon as more is known about the position paper, the heart experts want to study it intensively.
Last year, the German Interdisciplinary Association for Intensive Care and Emergency Medicine (Divi) explained in a position paper how organ donation could proceed after a controlled cardiac arrest: A hopelessly ill patient must have previously declared that he does not want to be resuscitated. The therapy is no longer curative but palliative, so it is no longer about healing but about relief. Intensive care measures will be discontinued.
Once cardiac arrest has been detected, there is an observation period, the so-called no-touch time, during which the patient is not touched. Divi speaks of five minutes, in other countries the wait is longer. Death is then determined, often with additional tests, and the organs are removed.
More organs such as kidneys, livers and hearts for seriously ill patients have been urgently needed for years. Last year, 965 people gave up one or more organs for others after their death, according to the coordinating German Organ Transplantation Foundation. At the same time, 8,400 people were on waiting lists. In order for donations to even be considered, two specialists must independently determine that a deceased person is brain dead.
Yes. The German Transplantation Society emphasizes that donation after death due to cardiac arrest and subsequent brain death is already established in many neighboring countries – “and has led to a significant increase in the donor pool there.” “In hardly any other European country is the disproportion between donor organs and patients who urgently need a new organ as great as in Germany,” said President Utz Settmacher.
Long-tested alternatives should be introduced – these include so-called DCD donation (donation after circulatory death), organ donation after a primary cardiovascular arrest and subsequent brain death. Almost all neighboring countries allow such donations.