From left to right: Prasad Garimella, OneLegacy’s COO, Tom Mone, OneLegacy’s CEO, Dr. Leonard Bailey, Chief of Pediatric Heart Surgery at Loma Linda University Med. Center, Mary Yamachika, Critical Care Director at Lakewood Regional Med. Center, Charrise Powell, House Supervisor at Lakewood Regional, and Ernesto Blas, OneLegacy’s Donation Development Coordinator for Lakewood.
HMG-CN Health Wire
Lakewood Regional Medical Center’s commitment to saving lives through donation was recognized by OneLegacy, the federally-designated organ, eye and tissue recovery agency in the greater Los Angeles Metropolitan area, during its annual Donation & Transplantation Symposium held Tuesday, October 21, 2014, at the Fairplex Conference Center in Pomona.
Lakewood Regional Medical Center received a “Process Excellence” recognition at the Symposium, one out of only 11 hospitals recognized amongst over 210 participating facilities. The medical center has a conversion rate larger than 75%, showing its excellence in following policies and procedures that make donation possible. Lakewood Regional also has a successful donation after cardiac death (DCD) program, in which families have the opportunity to donate organs on behalf of loved ones who suffer a severe neurological injury and/or irreversible brain damage but do not deteriorate to brain death.
The Donation & Transplantation Symposium is an annual conference hosted by OneLegacy that recognizes donation efforts in hospital and transplant centers across the Southland, and brings cutting-edge information to professionals in the field. This year the symposium reached its maximum capacity with over 900 healthcare professionals in attendance including physicians, nurses, transplant professionals, social workers, respiratory therapists and chaplains.
As was highlighted during the Symposium, the support of hospitals like Lakewood Regional to the donation process is vital for communities across the Southland. More than 7,000 people in the Los Angeles metropolitan region are waiting for a life-saving organ transplant, and over 80% of them are waiting for a kidney. It is estimated that 17 people die every day waiting for a transplant in the United States.
The attendees heard and discussed presentations on neonatal and pediatric donation; corneal transplants; advancements in organ donation; the role of palliative medicine in the donation process; and prevention of caregiver secondary traumatic stress.
Among the eminent plenary speakers where Nader Habashi, MD, FACP, FCCP, Associate Professor of Medicine at R. Adams Cowley Shock Trauma Center, University of Maryland; James Hynds, LL.B., PhD, Senior Clinical Ethicist at UCLA Health Systems; Marwa Kilani, MD, Medical Director of Palliative Care at Providence Holy Cross Medical Center; and Sandy Jo MacArthur, Assistant Chief at the Los Angeles Police Department.
Thanks to the close collaboration with hospitals like Lakewood Regional, last year OneLegacy recovered 1,374 organs for transplantation, and a record 2,044 eye and tissue donors, who provided skin used for abdominal repairs and burn dressings, bone to repair fractures and prevent amputation, heart valves to repair life-threatening defects, tendons to repair major knee injuries, and corneas to end blindness.
Since 1977, OneLegacy has served as the bridge between donors and patients awaiting life-saving transplants. OneLegacy works with over 210 hospitals and 11 transplant centers to serve over 19 million residents in the seven-county greater Los Angeles area. Those wishing to make the commitment to donate may register online at www.donateLIFEcalifornia.org or its Spanish-language counterpart, www.doneVIDAcalifornia.org. For more information about OneLegacy visit www.OneLegacy.org.
