Recently, there has been significant concern surrounding the procedures and conditions for donation after circulatory death (DCD). As organ procurement organizations face increased pressure, there have been conflicts and concerns over the expectations for how patients who have designated themselves as donors are treated prior to death, and at the time of the withdrawal of life sustaining treatment. This session will describe the effects and limitations of “first person authorizations” (FPAs) for donation, and how unresolved questions about the scope of FPA can lead to conflict over how and when life sustaining treatment is withdrawn, conflict over treatments for living patients designed to improve organ procurement but not the patient’s medical interests, and confusion about the kinds of information that should be disclosed to patients or their loved ones prior to organ procurement.
This session will describe these challenges, and discuss ethical considerations for their practical resolution.
Learning Objectives: After this webinar, attendees will be able to:
- Describe ethical considerations concerning DCD, First Person Authorization and the opt in process, and ethical disclosures about the procurement process.
- Analyze the ethical challenges associated with implementing first person authorization in the current landscape.
- Describe how the application of certain ethical commitments inform boundaries for the ethical practice of donation after circulatory death.
Speaker(s)
Joel Wu, JD, MPH, MA, HEC-C, is a Center for Bioethics Clinical Ethics Assistant Professor and a senior lecturer in the Division of Health Policy and Management at the University of Minnesota’s School of Public Health. He is a co-chair of the University of Minnesota Medical Center's Ethics Committee, co-lead for the clinical ethics consultation service for MHealth Fairview system hospitals, and member of the MHealth Fairview Ethics Council. Professor Wu also teaches courses at the intersection of clinical ethics, public health ethics, and public health law.
Previously, Professor Wu conducted health policy research and development at the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine at the Institute of Medicine (now the National Academy of Medicine) where he served as a study director on the Board on the Health of Select Populations and the Board on Population Health and Public Health Practice. Professor Wu also worked as a research associate for the former Engelberg Center for Health Care Reform at the Brookings Institution and completed post-doctoral fellowships at the Program in Bioethics and Professionalism at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN, and in Clinical Ethics at Children's Minnesota and Abbott Northwestern Hospitals in Minneapolis, MN. Professor Wu holds a JD and an MA in Bioethics from Case Western Reserve University and an MPH in Epidemiology from the University of Minnesota.