Give it up! Your organs that is

[okarol]

Give it up! Your organs that is

by Gordon Jackson/Special to ETR
Aug. 23, 2007

African Americans highly represented in organ recipients, poorly represented in organ donors.

Everson Walls and Ron Springs, both former standout football players from the glory years of the Dallas Cowboys, made the play of their lives this spring. And comedian-actor George Lopez and his wife, the former Ann Serrano, gave the performances of their lives two years ago.

Their grand accomplishments far exceeded anything that had to do with sports or entertainment, but involved something much more serious. The above friends and husband-and-wife team represent two of the most high-profiled stories to date about organ transplant operations, critical medical procedures that did more than win a ball game or a Grammy award -they saved lives.

The four individuals being African American and Hispanic are even more paramount.

The day of August 1 was National Minority Donor Awareness Day and every April has been designated
National Donate Life Month. They both represent a nationwide observance to raise awareness of the desperate need for donation and transplantation in the African American community (as well as the Latino community) and to educate the public on the facts and myths about organ donation.

The reason is simple: The African American community is in desperate need of African American organ and tissue donors. Although they make up 14 percent of the United States population, approximately 35 percent of those on the waiting list for kidney transplants are African American.

Other alarming statistics show:

* While Blacks comprise 27 percent of individuals on the national transplant waiting list, they represent only 12 percent of organ donors.

* As of May 2006, there were 25,177 African Americans registered on the U.S. transplant waiting list compared to 6,598 in 1991, a 382 percent increase.

* Approximately 51 percent of those waiting for a transplant are minorities and 27 percent of those are African Americans.

* In 2005, 5,212 African Americans received an organ transplant; there were 1,136 African American deceased donors and 889 living donors.

Springs, ailing badly from the effects of type 2 diabetes, which caused the amputation of a foot, managed to beat such odds when Walls, his best friend, found out that he was a match. As with all healthy humans having two kidneys, doctors told Walls that he could give one of his good ones to Springs and still maintain a healthy normal life.

“I would still do it again for my friend,” Walls told an audience this spring at a sports luncheon held at the African American Museum. “Whatever was going to affect Ron’s family, because we were so close, I knew it was going to effect mine. Once I was determined to do it, I was hell-bent.”

For his “hell-bent” actions, Walls, a Texas Black Sports Hall of Fame inductee, was later honored as a hero by the state legislature at the state capitol in Austin. State representative Helen Giddings spearheaded the tribute with wishes that it jolts others to do the same.

“It is my hope that the bond between Mr. Walls and Mr. Springs inspires each of us to do what we can to help our fellow man,” Giddings said. “Furthermore, I commend the two gentlemen for having the initiative to begin a foundation to encourage organ donation for both living and deceased donors. With death can spring life and with compassion spring hope.”

Walls was inspired by friend and fellow Dallas native Serrano. After finding out that husband George, star of the television series The George Lopez Show, and popular stand-up comedian, had deteriorating kidneys due to a genetic disorder, she did not hesitate to donate one of hers to Lopez in April 2005.

Other stories of successful kidney transplants have involved pro basketball players Alonzo Mourning and Sean Elliott. Unfortunately, there are also far too many stories of failures involving organ donor transplants among African Americans. Farrah Gray, the former teenage tycoon sensation, who became a millionaire at age 14, lost his sister, Greek, to leukemia in Sept. 2006 after failing to find a matching bone marrow donor.

“I’ve been speaking to everyone from Ebony to 20/20, especially Black people, to go out to their local blood banks and register to be an organ donor,” said Farrah Gray, now 21, who was honored last year at a Texas Publishers Association conference.” Only 3 percent of bone marrow donors are African American while they make up thousands of individuals being diagnosed with leukemia and we cannot find a donor match.”

Other highly publicized losses include Jackie Donahue, sister of rapper Nelly, who died of leukemia in March 2005 and pro football running back legend Walter Payton, who succumbed to a rare liver disease in November 1999. Both lives could have been saved by matching donors, but no one was found in time.
Pam Silvestri, public affairs manager, of the Dallas-based Southwest Transplant Alliance, thinks that the number of such heartbreaking stories in the African American community is about to curb down, if it hasn’t started already.

Reasons behind the severe lack of organ donors among African Americans include: An overall lack of trust in the medical industry due to previous cases of adverse treatment; Pure mis-education and lack of information about organ donation; The inability and thus resistance for the low-income and uninsured sector of the African American community to seek medical care, particularly among Black males; Traditional religious beliefs.

“We’re not out of the woods yet,” Silvestri said. “But the amount of donations has made leaps and bounds over the past 10 years. Our initial goal was to encourage minorities to donate at a rate that reflected the numbers within their population. We’ve blown past those numbers.”

Yet, with the number of African Americans needing new kidneys, other organs and fresh bone marrow having increased so sharply the last decade, Silvestri said they’ve had to raise the bar.

“Now, we’re encouraging minorities to donate at a rate that reflects the numbers on the waiting list,” she said. But lights of hope beam through, with more stories of everyday people of color receiving organ transplants and returning back to society.

“As more minorities get transplants and go back into the world, it’s helping subdue those fears,” Silvestri said. “They’re finding out that not everybody getting kidneys are White and rich. They’re seeing that a lot more look like them.”

Those looking like us include Walls and Springs, who have formed the Everson Walls and Ron Springs Gift of Life Foundation to get the word out to the African American community about organ and bone marrow donation and to shatter the debilitating myths.

“We’re going to make sure that we beat that drum for anyone that wants to hear about it,” Walls said.
Adverse religious beliefs have changed for the most part. Every major religion in the United States supports organ and tissue donation as one of the highest expressions of compassion and generosity.

Other programs and organizations are in place. Donate Life America is a national organization that directly seeks to educate the U.S. population about the need for organ and tissue donors. Anyone can be a potential donor, regardless of age or medical history. The good news is that a single donor can save or improve the lives of more than 50 people.

You can register to be living donor or arrange to have your organs donated in the event of your death. To learn more and find out how to be a donor in your state, go to www.donatelife.net.
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http://www.easttexasreview.com/story.htm?StoryID=4753