Organ donor shortage in Germany

Wondering where it's possible to get an organ donor card here in Germany... and is that alone enough to ensure that organs will get donated upon pronouncement of brain death?

Interesting article from the Goethe Institute
http://www.goethe.de/kug/ges/soz/thm/en202594.htm

This kinda thing.

This website claims that it is sufficient to carry a donor's card with you. You can either print out the pdf file, or enter your data, and they will send you a card:

http://www.herztransplantation.de/serv04.htm

I thought it was an opt-out system in Germany (i.e. you are automatically an organ donor unless you specifically choose not to be one and register as a non-donor). Is that not the case?

If you do not specifically state your choice in writing (in whatever way), your relatives will be asked to make the decision after you die. At least, that's what the "Arbeitskreis Organspende" says:

http://www.akos.de/

incase you're a UK citizen you might need to be careful - i know they don't accept blood from people who spent longer than 6 months in the UK between something like 1980 and 1994 .. don't know if the same would apply to organ donors though...

err we brits can forget it. if you lived in the uk between 84 and 96 (roughly) you can not donate as the germans think we all have bse or kreuz-jakobs and will infect them. actualy they're scared of somhow geneticly learning how to queue.

you have first to die. They don't accept living patients.

There are some exceptions, if they accept your blod, they could accept your "osseous marrow". (Not sure what's the right name. The thing which is inside your spine).
You need to register and they will need a blood sample to determine your type and find if you match someone in need. I did that in Switzerland, here I don't know how that would work.

bwhahaa... +karma for you

If you want to donate your organ(s), all you need to do is post an advertisement on the internet. Only problem could be that you don't get any guarantee as to what will be done with them after removal.

The quickest way would be to buy a motorbike and ride it about for a couple of months. I know doctors in the UK that call motorbike riders "donors". I think doctors have a dark sense of humour

Falco, I registered here in Germany, even though I´m a brit, and joined the list of donors waiting to be matched up to a leukaemia patient who needs a bone-marrow or maybe a cell-base transplant.

www.dkms.de to find out more

Their own blood test result seemed to matter more than any possible BSE contact I may have had in UK.

Also - they have contacted me twice in the last three years as a possible donor for someone, and done further tests: in the end they couldn´t use me,- but it makes you feel that the system works.

Sue

Personaly I try and donate my Organ every chance I get.