10/22/13

Who Gets an Organ Transplant?

PBS Teachers BREAKTHROUGHS IN MEDICAL RESEARCH

Who Gets an Organ Transplant?

Grade Level: 9-12 Subjects: Social Studies; Reading & Language Arts; Science & Technology Activity
Organ transplants save lives, but not everyone w ho w ants or needs an organ transplant can receive it. There are many issues/questions about this controversial issue; What are the obstacles that must be overcome for an organ recipient? Are all potential recipients treated equally? Is there a National Clearing House for them? How does someone get on the list? How many people die each year w aiting for an organ? Is there a w ay to get your name moved higher up on the list? Who makes those literal life and death decisions for others? Using the above questions as guides, have students interview staff at the local hospital or medical center. Is your community large enough to have a bioethics committee w ho w ould make those transplant decisions? (If your local hospital does not make those decisions, you may w ant to have your students interview chaplains and/or medical personnel about how the decision to "pull the plug" is made.) Once students have learned all they can from the professionals have them stage a debate in class. Establish the panel, a physician, a chaplain, and a medical ethicist. Give your students a scenario from your area, a dock w orker or truck driver desperately injured by heavy machinery or an executive felled by an unforeseen heart attack or stroke. Or perhaps you could take a famous one that might be in the new s currently and use that situation. Does this person already have a living w ill? If so, w ill that be enforced? What is the role of the family members? Do they have any say in this? What decision w ill your students make on behalf of the injured person? How do they justify that decision to themselves, the family and the staff? If possible have some of the professionals w ho might be called on to make these decisions present to inform the students how realistic your students debate really w as. Once the students have enacted this debate, have them journal their thoughts on this subject.

Online Resources
A Science Odyssey http://w w w .pbs.org/w gbh/aso/databank/entries/dm54ki.html FRONTLINE: "Organ Farm " http://w w w .pbs.org/w gbh/pages/frontline/show s/organfarm/ NOVA: "Electric Heart" http://w w w .pbs.org/w gbh/nova/eheart/ Religion and Ethics Weekly: Organ Donations http://w w w .pbs.org/w net/religionandethics/w eek311/cover.html How Stuff Works: Organ Transplants http://health.how stuffw orks.com/organ-transplant.htm

PBS Lesson Plans/Activities

NOVA Online: Electric Heart: Operation: Heart Transplant http://w w w .pbs.org/w gbh/nova/eheart/transplant.html NOVA: Life and Death in the War Zone
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10/22/13

Who Gets an Organ Transplant?

http://w w w .pbs.org/w gbh/nova/teachers/activities/3106_combatdo.html NOVA: Dying to Breathe http://w w w .pbs.org/w gbh/nova/teachers/activities/2013_breathe.html The Mysterious Hum an Heart: Endlessly Beating http://w w w .pbs.org/w net/heart/educators/activity-endlessly.html

Print Resources
Raising the Dead: Organ Transplants, Ethics and Society Ronald Munson The Ethics of Organ Transplants: The Current Debate Arthur L. Caplan and Daniel H. Coehlo

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