Organ donor centre set to open this year.

LANI ROSE R DIZON

DOHA THE Qatar Organ Donor Center, which will be responsible for the management and distribution of the organs donated for patients in need of organ transplant in the country, is set to open this year, said Dr Yousef al Maslamani, head of Organ Transplant Committee at the Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC).

The centre will also promote the culture of organ donation among residents through awareness campaigns and various programmes.

Speaking at a press conference on Wednesday, Dr Maslamani said, "To begin with, the donor centre would operate under the HMC, as it was the only hospital currently conducting organ transplants in Qatar." He said there were plans to hand over the management of the centre to a national body when other transplant centres have opened.

Currently, the HMC Organ Transplant Committee is also overseeing the HMC Qatar Organ Transplant Center which opened in November last year.

Maslamani said, "We are working to make the Qatar Organ Donor Center ready for opening soon. The centre will look after the clinical part of keeping the waiting list for the organs transplant. Now, kidney and liver are the only organs on the waiting list for transplant. We are working on the process to add cornea and pancreas to the list. With diabetes affecting about 20 percent of the population in Qatar, there is a large number of people in need of pancreas transplant." According to Maslamani, the attitude of the residents towards organ donation has changed considerably through the years. He said that about 400 people have signed their consent form for donation after death during the first week of the HMC organ donation campaign which was launched at the beginning of Ramadan.

He said, "For the last 10 years, we've been working on creating awareness about organ donation and transplantation among the public.

Today, the response has been impressive compared to many years back.

The transplant centre is also progressing with the increase in the number and calibre of its staff. We want it to be a centre of excellence.

That is why we get regular external evaluators every two to three months.

The last one came from Britain and once his report comes out we'll start implementing its recommendations." Speaking about the waiting lists for kidney transplants, Maslamani said there were around 500 kidney patients currently on dialysis and about 120 on the waiting list for kidney transplants. "Between five and six of the cases have relatives who are willing to donate their kidneys and will have their transplants done by the year-end," he said.

On the possibility of brain-dead patients donating their organs, Maslamani said, "We have our own trained coordinators who talk to the relatives and physicians to look after those patients. The staff in intensive care units play major role in educating patients' relatives about brain death. They tell them that the patient's brain is dead and there is no chance of the patient recovering.

Next step is for our coordinators to tell them about organ donation." Maslamani said there were about 50 brain-dead patients at the HMC and two of them have donated their organs.

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