Organ Donation Week 16 to 24 September

[JohnS]

It’s organ donation week 16 to 24 September (9 days). As part of raising awareness and encouraging people to talk to their loved ones about their wishes, NHS Trusts have asked teams to record distances walked, run, cycled etc.

 

Personal / Team Targets:

Travel 9km, a distance that represents the 9 lives one organ donor can save

Travel 40km to represent the 40 children who donated their organs last year

Travel 200km to represent the number of children who are currently waiting for a life saving transplant

Travel 300km a distance that represents the number of people currently waiting for a life saving heart or lung transplant

Travel 600km to raise awareness of the 600 people waiting for a liver transplant

Travel 900km, a number that represents the number of living kidney donors

Travel 1400km to honour the number of organ donors last year

Travel 3700km to celebrate the number of organs by the 1400 donors

Travel 5500km, a distance that represents the number of people waiting for a kidney transplant

Travel 7000km to represent the number of people currently waiting for a life saving transplant

Regional Target:

Travel 50,000km, a distance that represents the number of people living in the UK today with an organ transplant

People can simply record their activity as individuals but you might like to join a team and so help contribute to your local NHS trust winning the race. Or you’d be very welcome to join Northern Region’s North Cumbria Integrated Care NHS Trust’s team where I chair the Organ Donation Committee and provide a donor family perspective in the various discussions.

 

In North Cumbria on Monday we made awards to living donors where increasingly people are donating a kidney to a relative or altruistically. Tonight we’re unveiling a memorial statue in Whitehaven Hospital in commemoration of organ donors and their families.

 

Here’s the link to ‘Race for Recipients’ where you can register to participate either as an individual or for a team. You can record all your distances from Saturday 16 September once you’ve registered so your 10km Saturday fun run in the park or walking the dog would count. There’s also a wealth of material which expands the targets set out above and which may be of interest.

https://raceforrecipients.com/

 

[Fiz]

My whole family has organ donor cards.