Organ Donation Stamp- Please read.

Okarol suggested I post this here so it can be seen by all and not just on the Organ Donors section.

Most of you know I work at the Post Office. I recently got an update newletter in my email and was looking thru the new stamp issues. So I got to wondering.......

I contacted the editor and asked him.. " Don't we have an Organ Donation stamp"?

His reply was..
" one was issued bacn in 1998 but is no longer in circulation."

So after some rapid fire emails back and forth..I got this from the Citizens' Stamp Advisory Committee....

Just send letters advocating the re-issuance of the Organ and Tissue
Donation stamp to the address I provided. Say in the letter how the
stamp needs to be re-issued to keep bringing awareness and to help
educate people about the importance of organ and tissue donations. Add
some research that shows the trends of how many die annually because
they were unable to receive a transplant. If the numbers are going up,
you can state your case.

If you know of individuals or groups who would lobby for the stamp's
return, they should send letters to:

Citizens' Stamp Advisory Committee
c/o Stamp Development
U.S. Postal Service
1735 North Lynn Street, Suite 5013
Arlington, VA 22209-6432

Now.. I know.. that as active as this site is with all its wonderful members..we can get this done.
I am also sending this info to some other groups I know on just general organ donations and there are plenty of them
out there..

I would like to see the stamp re-issued and I know it can get done.

Here is a picture of it for you to view.

This one I'm showing here is the framed commemorative stamp... It's really quite beautiful.

*** Mods... I'm sorry if the pic is too big and I know you might need to adjust it's size.

We could start a petition but we would need everyones real name and someone to head this off. We could send names through email or PM, not on the forum.

It may help to have a form letter and then we could just paste and post?

Thats a great idea.. but we need someone that can write and get to the heart of the matter and.. get data to support our request.

A form letter would be perfect.. then we could just pring it out and send it off.

bump bump bumpity bump!

If I wasn't in school, I could do the research in depth besides writing to UNOS for current data. I would hate to have Karol do everything since she does so much already. I just got in the mail the current numbers as of he printing how many people are on the list for each organ and how many received a transplant last year. They are UNOS statistics that the American Transplant Association puts in each of it's newsletters. It does not state how many die waiting though. If we compile a letter that we can copy and paste to Word, we should include a little personal story and maybe our group logo. I think the American Diabetes Association does that with leters we send to our state senators for support, but haven't done one in 2 months.

Sounds good. See! I knew there would be someone with insight. If you paste some things here, maybe we could start work on it as time allows.

This part of a speech I gave. It has statistics and some ideas. We can add to it and take away from it. Or not use it at all.

Dialysis is when the blood is taken from the body and mechanically cleaned by machine, doing the job of the failed kidneys by removing toxins.

At the present time there are over 300,000 people on dialysis in the United States.

A patient requiring dialysis, but healthy otherwise, is an excellent candidate for a place on the waiting list for a healthy kidney.

As of this week there are 80,000 people are on the UNOS United National Organ Sharing wait list for a kidney transplant.
Each year 16,000 people receive kidney transplants.
This figure is only 20% of the people waiting for a kidney.
5,500 of the transplanted kidneys come from living donors.

On average every day around 17 people die while waiting for a transplant of a vital organ.

Nearly 4,000 new patients are added to the waiting list every month.

You can bury your organs, or you can cremate them when you die. Or you can donate them. Those are your only choices. If you agree to donate them you may save several lives. That is also your choice.

Less than 30% of the population has signed a donor card or has discussed organ donation with their family.

One organ or tissue donor has the potential to save 50 lives.

By signing your donor card you become a transplant donor after you pass away. This is called a cadaveric transplant. Many people waiting on the UNOS list do not have living donors available to them, and they require a cadaver donor. As you can imagine no one can live without a heart or lungs for very long. The medical profession harvests the organs from the deceased.

Now we have all seen the emergency TV shows where the doctors and nurses act like vultures swooping in on a grieving family and asking for donation of organs. Making your wishes known can prevent this. The California driver’s license has a place for you to mark on it if you would like to be an organ donor.

Organ donation happens only after the patient is declared brain dead. Organ and tissue recovery takes place only after all efforts to save your life have been exhausted and death has been legally declared. The quality of care that an individual receives prior to death is not altered.
Medical personnel must follow strict guidelines before death can be pronounced and organs and tissues are removed from a donor.
The doctors working to save your life are entirely separate from the medical team involved in recovering your organs and tissue. The law clearly states that the doctor who pronounced brain death must have nothing to do with the removal or transplantation of organs.
After organ removal, the body does not become disfigured.
As for religion, only Gypsies and Shintos are opposed to organ donation. This opposition stems from beliefs that the body must remain fully intact in the afterlife.
All other religions, however, view organ and tissue donation as a personal choice, and many believe it is an "act of neighborly love and charity.”

EVERYONE, regardless of health history, has the opportunity to give the gift of life, but only if you tell your loved ones. Despite declaring organ donation on your driver's license or with a donor card, your family MUST know of your wishes because they give final consent.

There are two kinds of living donors. One is a related or family donor. This is usually someone who is related to you who is a match to your blood type and is an antigen match to you.

The second donor is the person who can be called an altruistic donor. They have two kidneys and donate one to a kidney patient. The internet has become a popular way for most patients in need of an organ to find a donor, however, some transplant surgeons do not find this ethically sound and will refuse to operate.
It is illegal to buy and sell human organs in the United States. The only available organs are donated organs.
A living donor has to be healthy. There can be no high blood pressure, diabetes or health problems of any kind. They want you just as healthy after the donation as you were before.
I have a friend who has a daughter who became a kidney patient and went on dialysis at the age of 18. Her daughter finished high school while on dialysis. There was not a matching donor in the family. Her mother first searched for answers to the bladder problem the daughter had and finally found that answer. Then she began an Internet search for a living donor for her daughter. She posted her plea on websites such as livingdonorsonline.org. She received about 89 offers for a kidney. Her prayers were answered. A woman in Ohio offered to come to California and be her daughter’s living donor.

After 3 years of dialysis, 3 days a week, 4 hours a day, my friend’s daughter underwent kidney transplant in January 2007. She has now been free from dialysis for one year and is doing well. Her donor, 3 months after donating her kidney, ran in the Boston Marathon and placed in the top 14% of women runners.

National Donate Life Month is observed in April and was announced by President Bush in 2003. The month is a time to raise public awareness of the critical need for organ, tissue, marrow, and blood donation. The recognition during the month of April grew from the “National Organ Donation Week” that was declared by Congress in 1983. By changing the observance to a month, it underscores the importance of donation.

How can you help?
Decide if you want to become an organ and tissue donor.
Be sure to sign your driver’s license with a permanent marker.
Complete an organ donor card instead of, or in addition to, your driver’s license and carry it with you. The card, completed by you, indicates your wishes to be a donor.
Encourage others to sign up to be an organ donor.
Donate to the Organ Donor Trust Fund

Above all: Tell your family and friends about your decision to be an organ donor.

Why is this topic important to you? Because there is hope. The hope comes in the form of LIFE! Yes, you can give LIFE to a dialysis patient. How? By signing your donor card or by becoming a living donor yourself. At the end of your life or in case of accident are you going to give the gift that keeps on giving? Donate those organs. Do not bury them.

This stamp is beautiful. Let me know what I can do, Mysty.

I remember that stamp and I think we can do better. For one thing it is trading hearts. We need to focus on Kidneys. Not that organ donation is only kidneys but it is not "only" hearts either.

How about the green ribbon. That is more universal organ donation. Maybe the green ribbon with the Eiffel Tower and the Tierra??

This is the latest stats that I got in the mail regarding who got a transplant and how many are on the list. The letter is from the American Transplant Association, but the stats are from UNOS.
Chris

Kitkatz.. I love your speech..

I think if we take your speech add a heading and addressed to and the subject line and put it into word.. we would be set.

Rerun.. although I totally agree with you...the point is to bring out the awareness of donation.. all body parts from cornea to heart to anything useable.
It is also waaaaayyy easier to have a stamp re-issued than to specify a new directive for a new stamp... just a thought..

We can approach it both ways.. one for reissuance..
And I will contact them and ask the *powers that be* how to get a new stamp considered and will start a new thread on that.

I believe some dialysis patients can use more than just a kidney.. correct me if I am wrong please..

If no one has put it into word by this weekend.. I will and submit it to Sluff, Okaral and of course you Kitkatz since it is your speach.. and we can tweak it till its right then see where it can be put on the site and nudge everyone to simply print it out.. sign it.. slip it in an envelope and slap a stamp on it..

to all of you...

I agree with mysty about the fact that it would be easier to reissue than get a new stamp. I watched a show about how stamps are put into production. It takes several years for a new stamp to be finalized.

Quote from: mysty on April 16, 2008, 03:27:53 AM

If no one has put it into word by this weekend.. I will and submit it to Sluff, Okaral and of course you Kitkatz since it is your speach.. and we can tweak it till its right then see where it can be put on the site and nudge everyone to simply print it out.. sign it.. slip it in an envelope and slap a stamp on it..

I was never good in English class till I took technical writing, a different approach from writing a letter. I do better at an outline and go from there pretty much. Probably why I was elected to write my groups microbiology experiments lab results. I haven't heard back from UNOS yet on the death rate of people waiting for a transplant. I will resend the email incase it was forgotten.

I have it in word. I do not know if it can be posted here in word format. I will try it.

Quote from: Rerun on April 15, 2008, 07:00:05 AM

I remember that stamp and I think we can do better. For one thing it is trading hearts. We need to focus on Kidneys. Not that organ donation is only kidneys but it is not "only" hearts either.

How about the green ribbon. That is more universal organ donation. Maybe the green ribbon with the Eiffel Tower and the Tierra??

I have a dumb question...what do the Eiffel Tower and a Tiara (I'm assuming that's what you mean by "Tierra") have to do with organ donation?

I like the original, but yes I agree it would be better if it were more kidney oriented since that is something that can actually be donated by a living person.

Kidneys are the most transplanted organ.

Here is swebsite, but initially contacted them directly for information.ome information on death rate while waiting for a transplant. It is in percentages and not numbers which I asked UNOS for. I got this off their website, but when I asked for information, I directly asked for specific information. Hopefully get an answer this week.

I finally got a reply from UNOS with the data I requested today.

Thanks for the info!

I did not fully look at it till you aid something. I have to agree that they have the numbers in the wrong place, or I am zombie! Also think the numbers for the Heart and Lung transplant seem odd. For every transplant done that year, they all have died. Doesn't seem right to me, I woul think there would be some deaths, but not all of them dying. I'll have to email UNOS back about this, but hope I don't have to wait another month for a reply.

If I am amongst he dead as they say, I need BRAINS!!!!!

I deleted what I originally said! I figured out what the problem was. It was me. The chart is actually listing donors, not recipients. It would make sense that donors who provided kidney and pancreases would all be dead.

OHHHHH Crap!! I feel like a big idiot now. I fired an email to UNOS for clarification on that.

Wish I could stop that email from opening though after looking at the whole figures.
Time to fire another email back appologizing.

That's okay! I started the whole issue. I feel just as stupid as you! Sorry!