Thanksgiving Service At Ely Cathedral To Honour East Anglian Organ Donors And Their Families, UK
March 30, 2017
Thanksgiving service at Ely Cathedral to honour East Anglian organ donors and their families
More than 1,000 people are expected to attend a special thanksgiving service at Ely Cathedral to honour the memories of those who died and donated their organs for transplant.
The event which takes place on Sunday (15 May) will bring together the families of deceased donors from Cambridgeshire, Suffolk, Norfolk and Essex, as well as patients who received transplants at Addenbrooke's and Papworth hospitals.
This will be the seventh service of its kind in the region over the past 14 years.
According to Sue Falvey of NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT) who helped organise the first event while working as a transplant co-ordinator at Addenbrooke's and Papworth hospitals, it will be a moving event.
Miss Falvey, who is now Head of Nursing Development at NHSBT, said: "Although the day will be emotional for many, we hope that people will find it inspirational and uplifting. It will help remind people that the gift given by donors at the end of their lives is not forgotten or taken for granted.
"People will be coming from all over East Anglia and beyond, including some from overseas. It's a tremendous event which gives anyone who has been affected by donation and transplantation in this region the chance to come and pay their respects and show their gratitude."
Among those attending will be Pauline Morgan whose daughter Kirsten died tragically in a car accident, aged just 19.
Pauline said: "Kirsten signed up to the NHS Organ Donor Register when she was 16 and even though it was incredibly hard to be faced with the decision to give the chance of life to another, the fact that Kirsten had a donor card made the decision easier. It was her wish, and her gift and her thoughtfulness for others typified her personality. As a parent I am so proud of her for making this choice.
"The service for me is a huge thank you to the donors, to acknowledge their gift and for the recipients to say thank you. I see it as a tribute to every family who had the ability to think of others before themselves, and give the chance of another shot at life to a stranger. I wouldn't miss this chance to pay tribute to Kirsten."
Thanks to the altruism of donors and their families, 3709 organs were made available for transplantation from April 2009 to March 2010 and nearly 1000 lives were were saved as a result.
Bishop David (Suffragan Bishop of Ely) will be attending the service and taking part in the hymns and lighting of candles, along with an organ recipient, and the medical teams involved from both hospitals.
Notes
The service will honour deceased organ donors from Suffolk, Norfolk, Essex and Cambridgeshire and recipients of those organs who had organ transplants at Papworth and Addenbrooke's Hospitals.
The Thanksgiving service was previously organised by the Organ Donor Services teams within hospitals working directly for the NHS Trust concerned. In 2009 the Organ Donation Taskforce recommended that all Donor transplant Co-ordinators (now called Specialist Nurses: Organ Donation) within donor services teams should be employed by one national organisation - NHS Blood and Transplant and their employment was transferred.
NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT) is a Special Health Authority in the NHS. It is the organ donation organisation for the UK, with responsibility for matching and allocating donated organs. Its remit also includes the provision of a safe, sufficient supply of blood and associated services to the NHS.
The NHS Organ Donor Register (ODR) records the details of people who have registered their wishes to donate organs and/or tissue after their death for transplantation. This information is checked after someone has died by authorised medical staff to establish whether a person wanted to donate. There are almost 18 million people on the NHS Organ Donor Register, equivalent to 29% of the UK population.
- It's simple to join the ODR by:
- going here
- ringing 0300 123 23 23
Anyone can register on the ODR. Age isn't a barrier to being an organ or tissue donor and neither are most medical conditions. People in their 70s and 80s have become organ donors and saved many lives. The oldest recorded cornea donor was 102.
One donor can save or transform up to 9 lives and many more can be helped through the donation of tissues.
There are currently 7,677 (at 10.05.11) people in the UK on the active waiting list for an organ transplant. This figure changes constantly as people join and leave the transplant list. Further people are on the suspended list because they are too ill or unable to receive a transplant at present. This brings the current total needing an organ transplant in the UK to more than 10,000.
Source:
NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT)