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Gene Pierce – The Legacy of an Organ Donation, Transportation, and Transplantation Pioneer

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60 years ago, Gene Pierce was a Sunday school teacher and Boy Scout troop leader in his free time. For his day job, he worked in the marketing department at Chesapeake Pulp and Paper Mill in West Point, Virginia—where he was instrumental in developing Green Life Fertilizer.1

When Gene found out that he and his wife were expanding their family to five children, he realized he needed to make a little more money. There happened to be two job openings at the time that interested him: One at the railroad company and the other at Medical College of Virginia (MCV). Read the full story.

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On National Donor Day, organ recipient breaks down misinformation

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On New Year’s Day, USC junior Selah Kitchiner floated down Colorado Boulevard on a conveyance both dazzling and ephemeral. The purple and gold 2022 Donate Life Rose Parade float was covered in roses, sunflowers and seaweed with Venetian columns and arches that rose two stories. Kitchiner was just above street level, posing as a gondolier, oar in hand. No rowing was required, though she did plenty of waving during her hour-long Rose Parade ride.

“I waved to anybody with a USC chair or sweatshirt, anybody who made eye contact,” Kitchiner said. “If a spectator was daydreaming and they saw me wave at them, they would kind of snap out of it.” Read the full story.

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Doctor to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro to raise awareness for living kidney donation

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As an emergency physician at FirstHealth of the Carolinas, endurance athlete and anonymous kidney donor, Matthew Harmody, M.D., has never been one to shy away from difficult, impactful work. His next challenge combines physical fortitude and living kidney donation advocacy as he joins 21 other kidney donors to climb the world’s largest free-standing mountain, Mount Kilimanjaro, in Tanzania, Africa.

The One Kidney Climb is coordinated by the nonprofit organization Kidney Donor Athletes (KDA) to bring attention to the need for living kidney donors and demonstrate that one can donate a kidney and still live a healthy and active lifestyle. The group is scheduled to reach Mount Kilimanjaro’s summit — 19,341 feet above sea level — on World Kidney Day, March 10, 2022. Read the full story here.

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New kidney and pancreas transplant allocation policies in effect

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“UNOS has implemented a new system for matching kidney and pancreas transplant candidates with organs from deceased donors.

The new approach is projected to increase equity in transplant access for candidates nationwide. It replaces distribution based on donation service area (DSA) and OPTN region with a more consistent measure of distance between the donor hospital and the transplant hospital for each candidate. This will further ensure the right organ gets to the right patient at the right time based on medical need rather than geography.

The policy was developed over nearly three years by organ donation and transplant experts, organ recipients and donor families from around the country, and input from thousands of people during three public comment cycles.

Kidney and pancreas offers will be offered first to candidates listed at transplant hospitals within 250 nautical miles of the donor hospital. Offers not accepted for any of these candidates will then be made for candidates beyond the 250 nautical mile distance.

Candidates also will receive proximity points based on the distance between their transplant program and the donor hospital. Proximity points are intended to improve the efficiency of organ placement by adding priority for candidates closer to the donor hospital. Candidates within the initial 250 nautical mile radius will receive a maximum of two proximity points, while those outside the initial circle will receive a maximum of four proximity points. The point assignment will be highest for those closest to the donor hospital and will decrease as the distance increases.”

Read all about the new policy, here.

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