The Gift of Life: Why Organ and Tissue Donation?

Last year approximately 28,000 Americans received a life-saving organ transplant and more than one million Americans received a life-changing tissue transplant. When just one individual makes the decision to donate, they can change the lives of more than 50 others.

And while more than 95 percent of American adults approve of donation as a viable, life-giving practice, only 52 percent of Ohioans are registered donors. Change that statistic – register to be an eye, organ or tissue donor now.

Register Now

Why give life?

Every day 18 men, women, and children die while waiting for an organ transplant. And every 10 minutes another person is added to the national waiting list for organ donation.

Startling numbers reflect the lives lost and saved by donation:

U.S.
  • Number of lives saved in 2010 – 28,662
  • Number of lives lost while waiting in 2010 – 6,603
  • More than 1 million people benefit from tissue transplants each year
Ohio
  • 3,419 people are waiting; 800 of them are in central Ohio
  • 181 people died waiting in 2010, that’s about one Ohioan every other day
  • In 2010, 303 Ohioans were organ donors at the time of their death, helping 901 individuals receive a second chance at life through transplantation
  • 1,619 Ohioans gave improved quality of life to others through tissue donation
  • In 2010, Lifeline of Ohio recovered organs from 84 donors and tissue from 332 donors
National Waiting List
  • 90,5510 patients waiting for a kidney transplant
  • 16,120 patients waiting for a liver transplant
  • 1,327 patients waiting for a pancreas transplant
  • 2,106 patients waiting for a kidney-pancreas transplant
  • 275 patients waiting for an intestine transplant
  • 3,126 patients waiting for a heart transplant
  • 62 patients waiting for a heart-lung transplant
  • 1,668 patients waiting for a lung transplant

As of 01/06/12 - 112,545  TOTAL PATIENTS WAITING*

* Some patients are waiting for more than one organ; therefore, the total number of patients is less than the sum of patients waiting for each organ.

Numbers of Transplants Performed During 2010
  • 16,899 kidney transplants
  • 6,291 liver transplants
  • 349 pancreas transplants
  • 828 kidney-pancreas transplants
  • 151 intestine transplants
  • 2,333 heart transplants
  • 41 heart-lung transplants
  • 1,770 lung transplants

28,662 TOTAL TRANSPLANTS PERFORMED*

Number of Donors, 2010

7,943 Deceased
6,561 Living

14,505 TOTAL DONORS*

* Based on data from the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, as of Jan. 6, 2012 – data subject to change due to future submissions or corrections.