Over the last year or so, I've read about the controversy surrounding organ donation (think hearts, not kidneys). Is it possible to avoid these procedures altogether as an anesthetist? e.g. negotiating with employers up front about procedures you would not do.
IMO, it's a must-have conversation for future anesthetists.
There's controversy surrounding the usage of "brain death" as the medical definition of death (see NHBD/DCD). From what I've read, organs harvested from procedures based on this definition may essentially kill the patient prior to and in anticipation of his/her imminent, actual death. The death is at some point, planned, in order to preserve maximum organ freshness.
This raises a grave moral objection in my mind. However hopeless or close to death someone may be, the end (killing someone by harvest, even moments before death) simply does not justify the means (best case: prolonging or saving a life). Not to mention, an anesthetist, by facilitating transplant of an organ harvested this way, is implicated in benefiting from murder or consenting to its ill-gotten gains.
Any thoughts? Can an anesthetist be transplant-free (maybe excepting kidneys and non-vital organs)?
For more on the procedure known as "non-heart-beating organ donation" (NHBD) which has turned into "after cardiac death" (DCD), see here: http://www.mercatornet.com/articles/view/organ_donation_crossing_the_line
Note: I'm not trying to spread propaganda. I realize this is a very complicated, highly sensitive issue undergoing vigorous debate and inquiry (it should). My purpose isn't to solve the matter conclusively for anyone, but to ask how it might affect someone going into anesthesia.
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