> I grew those organs in my body, for my son. And now they’re working inside the bodies of total strangers, supporting the lives of people I will probably never meet. Or possibly never hear from.
That's a moving article. Hard to imagine facing this for my own kid.
>I also learned that the care team doesn’t just wheel the donor away. They send them off with an Honor Walk. The doctors and nurses who worked to keep my son’s organs functioning at optimal levels joined local family, friends, and colleagues, packed shoulder-to-shoulder (pre-COVID) to line the short corridor from the ICU to the surgical suite for the ceremonial transport of my son’s body.
I am glad there are people like this. For my part, I am not an organ donor intentionally. I stopped being one when I realized I (and my kin) would be the only ones not getting paid in the following chain:
1. Me (body)
2. Organ Procurement Organization
3. Hospital + Insurer
4. Organ Transplant Team
Each time I get a new licence I check the box in a moment of weakness and have to go opt-out again. Over the next year, I hope to write down a fee schedule and a quick-to-sign contract that will hopefully bring down the friction to get my organs down to 15 min after my death for someone who can pay appropriately.
If anyone else is working on ways to bypass anti-organ-sale laws, I'd love it if we could work together. Email in profile.
Is it irrelevant or something? It felt relevant on this article and considering this is a startup site.
I don't mean to diminish the benefit of watching another young man being able to run and live with the heart of one's child in him but merely to ensure that some part of the value chain comes to rest where the person providing a crucial piece intended.
EDIT-Response since I'm now rate-limited.
User psychometry: I am not complaining about the downvotes, to be clear. I don't mind being voted down by people who disagree with me since that is how this platform is intended to be used. I would prefer not to because it makes what I say hard to see but if the community believes it doesn't fit, then it doesn't fit. This comment was intended to be a request for clarification from this guy, but if no one wants to share that's also okay. I won't be very upset. It is a sunny day in San Francisco with no traffic. I will go for a ride and if I am to die on my motorcycle, my organs will rot. That is unfortunate, but perhaps if that happens a year from now, they will instead be of use, and my family will be wealthier by some small measure.
You're getting downvoted into oblivion because you wrote an astonishingly selfish and moronic screed because of some kind of weird financial code you apparently live by. Truly bizarre.
I'm sorry, what? Are you saying aren't an organ donor because your family would not get paid for it? How would you value the organs? Do you believe having the ability to pay for an organ makes one more morally deserving to live?
Ah, for the same reason that you pay someone's estate for their land rather than just take it for the good of everyone. We do not consider one's remains the property of one's estate, strictly. We only recognize one's right to interment or alternative disposal to be executed by one's kin etc. I believe this is wrong. I have spent quite a few decades growing me and ownership of this body must rest more strongly with my estate than any other possession I have.
In keeping with that, I intend to retain the right to disposal of this possession as I see fit.
EDIT-response:
user munk-a: I think I am content to have my body treated just as other property that I have owned in my life. If inheritance laws prohibit inheriting property but permit putting it in a never-dying trust, then I will prefer that my body be treated as such. If all property is transferred to the state upon death, then so be it for my body. I am not anti-social. I merely have this one (apparently peculiar) view on ownership of one's body.
Actually, personally, I despise all inheritance related laws - I understand the historical origin of them and they did make quite a bit of sense but in this modern world I think the only thing that inheritance does is degrade any attempts we might make at moving more toward a meritocracy.
Then again I was strongly influenced by Longhouse traditions growing up and also feel rather neutral on private property ownership in general.
I'd love to see the social media or technology you willingly use and donate information to that allows others to get rich off your non-compensated usage.
I intend to set it up so that, should they refuse the proceeds, the money is spent in a manner I feel is optimal. For instance, if I were to be able to sell my heart for $100k to a rich industrialist's son, then that's 101 lives saved (1 from the heart, 100 from GiveWell's current best).
I believe that I will spend the money better than the rich industrialist, so it makes sense for me to back me over him.
EDIT-response:
User dougmwne: Thank you. I do actually have life insurance. That is only sensible considering I ride a motorcycle. I do not disagree that professionals performing a professional duty should be permitted the right to charge for their services.
I think, if transplant surgery were not a protected employment category I would be content to give my organs for free to those not operating in the for-profit system and charge (as raw materials) those who operate in the for-profit system. It's no different from your surgeon charging you for your hip implant. Someone gets paid for manufacturing that hip implant. I merely want to get paid for manufacturing this heart.
Or you could buy life insurance like the rest of us! Upvotes for the lateral thinking though and since your downvoters are treating it like the disagree button. I don't think you deserved to have the post deleted. My fundamental disagreement is that I think the staff and professionals that carry out the donation process and medical procedures are completely worthy of their pay and that the recipients pay for the medical procedure, not the materials. If they paid market rate for the organs, these lifesaving procedures would be even more out of reach.
That sounds like an incredibly selfish decision; for-profit healthcare is the reality in the United States (where I'm guessing you're from), so why deny others that benefit just because of the system?
It's very interesting - sort of like college athletics. Everyone makes good to insane money - except the people taking the big health risks and/or putting in the hours.
A lot of moral outrage at the idea here though usually from folks getting rich off the industry.
There have been proposals to do something like $10 - $20K for a liver. The way to get around the outrage mob is usually to point out the health risks, impacts on life a quality of life etc.
In short, if you were in a car crash and lost a liver, you'd be getting a big pay day for those things.
Normal split is 1/3 or so to hospital, and 2/3 kept by donor network admins I think for the fees they charge for Organ acquisition. Donor Network West in CA does $90M a year or so I think? I'm not sure what annual fees are nationally, I'd expect in the 100's of millions range (this does not include all the costs to actual do the transplant).
That said, any discussion on this type of topic tends to attract of one liner type attacks from the outrage folks - so not usually worth having.
But folks are thinking about how to dramatically increase donor rates because it is so impactful. Other options have been to pay $100 - 500/year you list as a donor etc which would save incredible numbers of lives at what is relatively low cost. I heard one funny idea which was to do this for folks who get M class licenses (motorcycles). The idea was to both scare them about the risks of riding a motorcycles and of course they really are more likely to be a donor per mile riden (I'm a rider, and the stats are actually terrible in contrast to other things people worry about)
> The way to get around the outrage mob is usually to point out the health risks, impacts on life a quality of life etc.
I'm confused- we're talking about post-mortem organ donation... What quality of life are you referring to? Quality of life for living donors? How does that apply in a discussion where the donors have passed away?
More organ donors would be a good thing, give folks $100 one time gift card for signing up - you'd have a ton of folks do that and the cost is tiny.
Maybe $2,500 to help with funeral expenses if you scoop all their organs out and sell them for $2.6M (that's probably average billed charges for a heart / kidney transplant).
Reality - the folks with the money (transplant surgeons, athletic directors in colleges) and their supporters here will NEVER share with the folks running around on courts and fields (college athletes) or providing the organs or whatever. You actually see this pattern over and over, usually with a fair bit of suffering on the side (folks not able to get transplants, injured college athletes etc).
Certainly I would have found this position harder to justify when I was covered by the NHS. It is likely that I would remain an organ donor there since everyone is pulling together and I wouldn't want to be the one getting in the way.
EDIT: Oh and some of you have asked me questions. This platform has now blocked me from responding for some duration, presumably to stop flamebait or troll threads (neither of which is what I was up to). I am happy to continue this conversation over email (in profile) or alternatively I can have a vaccinated representative meet you in person in San Francisco to discuss over coffee.
Wow, you do seem to have ruffled many feathers. One of your posts is dead and flagged.
Anyway I fully agree - you can do what you want with your body, others should have no say.
p.s - see if my profile, or the link on my profile catches your attention.
I was hoping the OP comment would be flagged dead rather quickly, but this was essentially my response too. I emigrated from the US to Canada purely because of this pervasive mentality that "I can't suffer you to benefit unless I'm getting something out of the deal". It isn't held by everyone in America or even the majority as far as I've seen - but what's weird is that in the US that view is socially acceptable and that's pretty horrifying to me.
Not everything in life is a transaction where you're either the winner or the loser. Trying to measure things in that manner will lead you to lose out on a lot of joy.
The issue is that you are supporting a bunch of for profit businesses making an absolute killing, while not even throwing table scraps to the key players, the donors.
If someone is going to harvest my Organs and get paid $800K+ per year (California Transplant Surgeon's probably average $750K and some are making $2-3M/year) it's really hard to swallow your and their morally superior tone.
Hey - I absolutely applaud you if you're going to help tear down the private portions of the organ trade business. It should be a publicly managed service like healthcare in general - but for now this is what we're stuck with and a lot of innocent lives are on the line.
I think that, in the long run, it's pretty immoral to throw table scraps at the donors since it'll create some very perverse market incentives to make certain your organ isn't "being wasted" on some penniless orphan somewhere.
I decided to leave insane American wages behind for a society that cares more about egalitarianism - that isn't solving the problem but it's the best contribution I can personally make.
I don't think that's an American sentiment. I've heard people cite religious reasons or conspiratorial suspicions about being left to die in the hospital after suffering a serious injury, but nothing even remotely echoing what OP posted.
I'd prefer not to name specific countries, but there are certain overseas markets with thriving black market organ trades. That is what first came to mind when OP expressed the desire that his family be compensated for his organs. Considering some of these cultures have arguably similar existing customs (e.g. intentionally killing a pedestrian that you have accidentally injured but offering the family a large sum of money in exchange for silence) what the OP stated may not be considered unreasonable to someone looking at the world through that lens.
> Over the next year, I hope to write down a fee schedule and a quick-to-sign contract that will hopefully bring down the friction to get my organs down to 15 min after my death for someone who can pay appropriately.
There is a lot of mysticism around our bodies once we pass on - and when that happens we've lost all the ability to bask in the honor of our act or receive the appreciation - but our bodies are also quite worthless to ourselves at that point and can be of an immense value to others.
Organ donation is a very sensitive subject since it can be viewed as losing the coherence of all that remains of someone, but the benefits to others can be extreme. This particular story involved someone getting a heart transplant and, while it was surely a loss that this individual died, after they died they enabled another person who had a limited lease on life to get a lot more time out of something that would have decayed in the ground or be cremated.
I'm all for organ donation, but it's something we'll look back on in 60 years and marvel at how complicated and crude it was compared to growing new ones with the patient's own cells. In the mean time it's definitely a silver lining for those left behind.
Why would your family object? Among other reasons it's your body, not theirs, but apart from that by what basis would anyone choose to object to helping others in this way?
I figure the worms will eat me anyway, so why not be an organ donor?
I don't find any comfort in visiting the gravesites of relatives, either. Whatever made them what they were isn't there. My father once told me that a dead body is like a house with nobody home. That's how I feel about it, too.
"and managing hospital bills that would soon follow. The donor network takes over medical costs once a patient officially enters the program, but there was still the matter of the pricey care that preceded it."
It never occurred to me that the American healthcare system is so ruthless that even if someone dies your family has to pay for your care. How absolutely cruel and awful.
> Why would the family be responsible for his costs
I think for the same reason that your family gets control of your assets. Neither transfer is deserved, but if you allow one then you have to also allow the other.
Sorta - this issue is a bit more complex when it comes to shared property. If you live in a multi-generational home technically owned by your grandfather and he passes away then the house may be seized during any debt resolution or bankruptcy filing.
Debts don't get passed on but they can eliminate the value of estates being transferred.
I think it's perfectly legitimate to question whether any assets or debts should be transferred on death but right now society is such that some people will be depending on that inheritance since they're inheriting the roof that they've been living under all their life.
Depends on the locale. As I understand it, in Korean law, both assets and debts are transferred to next of kin when one dies. Relatives of debtors have to go through a legal procedure to make sure that they don't become next-in-line for any debts or assets when the debtor dies.
Through inflicting financial pain, the US healthcare system is supposed to motivate consumers to seek out higher value, leading to competition and efficiency. But since medical services are a classic example of "market failure", all that's left is unavoidable pain.
The country I live in has three healthcare systems: Public (Free), Social security (Payroll funded) and Private (Paid by yourself or your optional private insurance).
The private one has the shortest waiting times and doctors are assigned less patients.
Some things that have happened to me in the private system and I didnt like were:
- Having to pay my bill about two hours after waking up from anesthesia. Literally signing the credit card receipts while on my hospital bed.
- Another time, having to sign an IOU before being admitted, on the emergency room bed.
- One of my doctors throwing away all my medical records, because "they were old and took too much space".
DNRs are very common in America for a reason separate from the rest of the world - elsewhere they tend to be mostly a philosophical choice to minimize your own personal pain and cost on society. In America they primarily exist to shield family members from cost - it isn't uncommon for a funeral to be accompanied by a lot of additional stress because your father was kept alive for five additional days at a cost of 50k/day and suddenly the surviving family is trying to sort out grief, finding a quarter of a million dollars (or potentially sending the entire estate into bankruptcy) and the additional tens of thousands of dollars funerals cost.
Death in America is pretty darn expensive.
Edit: I'd clarify something - in the US (like almost everywhere) debt cannot be inherited alone. An estate can be declared bankrupt when someone dies and then debtors are limited to just taking chunks out of the estate to the best of their ability - but if shared property is held by the deceased then it can cause serious harm to inheritors. My favorite example is a multi-generational house which can force inheritors into debt to keep the roof over their head.
>> in the US (like almost everywhere) debt cannot be inherited alone
In Poland(where I'm from) it can. When my father died I basically had to make a choice within a few weeks of his death - either refuse the inheritance entirely, or accept it with all his known and unknown debts. The second options meaning that if someone comes to me in 10 years time saying "hey I have this paper signed by your dad 20 years ago saying he owes me a million dollars" well, I now legally owe this person a million dollars. There is no concept of an estate of the deceased that gets settled first before any inheritance is given out(if anything remains). No, you have to make a choice whether you accept everything(including debts) or literally nothing at all. And you have to make the choice quickly because you cannot manage anything owned or related to the deceased(their bank accounts, mortgages etc) until you make the decision.
In general, in America, parents are not responsible for adult children's medical bills, even when on shared insurance. Managing != paying for out of her own pocket.
Yeah, it's a complete mess too. It really depends on the situation. For adults, with their own coverage, most medical debts are covered by the deceased's estate until it is insolvent. Family members are not required to pay the debt (unless a spouse in a community property state) though the hospital/insurance companies will absolutely try to get you to pay.
However, some states have laws that require adult children to pay the debts of their parents should they end up in a nursing home or similar.
I don't know if my organs will be used when I die, but I sure hope so. There's some sort of zen feeling knowing that my death may result in someone's life being saved or made easier. The decision was quite easy to make. That initial talk with my family was a bit of an awkward subject to bring up, but that's about the only unpleasant side to it.
I believe GP was suggesting that making a decision should be mandatory at some point. While I personally prefer the default here be to opt in as a donor, GP suggested merely that a decision as to yes or no should be required.
Where I live, one must state organ donor preference when obtaining a driver's license. I believe the default answer is no if you choose not to choose.
Nope, that would be a disaster. While the intent here is good it will lead to the very unfortunate side effects like incentivizing organ trade where a person would be killed under some pretext ( or even without a pretext) just to harvest his organs. I believe this already happens in some parts of the world.
People who are not organ donors should receive organs with lower priority than those who are. That would only be fair - and it would get people to sign up.
I wasn't expecting the emotional response I just got from that. Thank you for your story, sorry for your loss.
My father was the recipient of a lung transplant. It saved his life and enabled him to meet all of his grandchildren. We are forever grateful to the donor that allowed Dad to live.
The part about the honor walk is really great. My father was killed in a terrorist attack 18 years ago and we were able to donate his organs (he was shot in the head so was brain dead but his body was mostly fine). It was in Israel and there wasn't anything ceremonious about it at the time. I signed the consent form, we were given some time to say goodbye, and that was it, we just went home and left him. It was around noon, and IIRC by evening his liver, lung and kidneys were already being transplanted.
I have to say that it was comforting to know he saved lives. We got to meet two of the families of the people he saved. One was a Palestinian family, who came to visit us and were really wonderful given the circumstances. The other one we met was a 12 year old boy who got a kidney, and as far as I know is still alive and kicking with part of my dad in him. That's incredible.
None of this makes up for how awful losing my dad was, but knowing it also did some good in this world is a tiny comfort.
Proud to be a registered organ donor after reading this. If you want to do something right now, you can donate blood every 8 weeks. I just got a text message notification that my most recent donation (last Thursday) was just sent to a hospital, between reading the article and making this comment.
I love articles like this. I wish there was an hn for articles. Not tech. Not some random lisp interpreter, but things like "The hunt for the death valley germans", the story about the nuclear power device in the mountains in nepal, this post.
I'm so sorry for your loss. Thank you so much for sharing. Love seeing stuff like this on HN. You can also be a living donor and donate part of your liver, lung, etc.
I opted out. For the sole reason that I don't think this planet lacks humans enough to justify prolonging some lifes more than their own bodies allowed them to.
This is a good reminder to me to double-check my own organ donor status. And also to review the information I asked for a received regarding what is involved in leaving my body to science. (In a morbid kind of way, I'm hoping my remains end up at the forensic taphonomy research facility[1] in NSW.)
My daughter received a donor’s heart at 6 months old, after hers had been shredded beyond repair by a virus. I’ve tried to write a thank you note to the donor family several times, but each time I’ve thrown it away. The words feel so hollow and small compared to the gift we were given.
It feels selfish to not write just because I can’t get out of my own way emotionally — but what can you possibly say?
Just say, "Thank you." It doesn't need to be long and complex: "I'm sorry for your loss; but, I id like you know that your son's/daughter's heart has given our daughter a second chance. Thank you."
Don't over think it. You'll never get it "perfect."
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[ 2.8 ms ] story [ 170 ms ] threadDamn.
>I also learned that the care team doesn’t just wheel the donor away. They send them off with an Honor Walk. The doctors and nurses who worked to keep my son’s organs functioning at optimal levels joined local family, friends, and colleagues, packed shoulder-to-shoulder (pre-COVID) to line the short corridor from the ICU to the surgical suite for the ceremonial transport of my son’s body.
1. Me (body)
2. Organ Procurement Organization
3. Hospital + Insurer
4. Organ Transplant Team
Each time I get a new licence I check the box in a moment of weakness and have to go opt-out again. Over the next year, I hope to write down a fee schedule and a quick-to-sign contract that will hopefully bring down the friction to get my organs down to 15 min after my death for someone who can pay appropriately.
If anyone else is working on ways to bypass anti-organ-sale laws, I'd love it if we could work together. Email in profile.
I don't mean to diminish the benefit of watching another young man being able to run and live with the heart of one's child in him but merely to ensure that some part of the value chain comes to rest where the person providing a crucial piece intended.
EDIT-Response since I'm now rate-limited.
User psychometry: I am not complaining about the downvotes, to be clear. I don't mind being voted down by people who disagree with me since that is how this platform is intended to be used. I would prefer not to because it makes what I say hard to see but if the community believes it doesn't fit, then it doesn't fit. This comment was intended to be a request for clarification from this guy, but if no one wants to share that's also okay. I won't be very upset. It is a sunny day in San Francisco with no traffic. I will go for a ride and if I am to die on my motorcycle, my organs will rot. That is unfortunate, but perhaps if that happens a year from now, they will instead be of use, and my family will be wealthier by some small measure.
In keeping with that, I intend to retain the right to disposal of this possession as I see fit.
EDIT-response:
user munk-a: I think I am content to have my body treated just as other property that I have owned in my life. If inheritance laws prohibit inheriting property but permit putting it in a never-dying trust, then I will prefer that my body be treated as such. If all property is transferred to the state upon death, then so be it for my body. I am not anti-social. I merely have this one (apparently peculiar) view on ownership of one's body.
Then again I was strongly influenced by Longhouse traditions growing up and also feel rather neutral on private property ownership in general.
I believe that I will spend the money better than the rich industrialist, so it makes sense for me to back me over him.
EDIT-response:
User dougmwne: Thank you. I do actually have life insurance. That is only sensible considering I ride a motorcycle. I do not disagree that professionals performing a professional duty should be permitted the right to charge for their services.
I think, if transplant surgery were not a protected employment category I would be content to give my organs for free to those not operating in the for-profit system and charge (as raw materials) those who operate in the for-profit system. It's no different from your surgeon charging you for your hip implant. Someone gets paid for manufacturing that hip implant. I merely want to get paid for manufacturing this heart.
A lot of moral outrage at the idea here though usually from folks getting rich off the industry.
There have been proposals to do something like $10 - $20K for a liver. The way to get around the outrage mob is usually to point out the health risks, impacts on life a quality of life etc.
In short, if you were in a car crash and lost a liver, you'd be getting a big pay day for those things.
Normal split is 1/3 or so to hospital, and 2/3 kept by donor network admins I think for the fees they charge for Organ acquisition. Donor Network West in CA does $90M a year or so I think? I'm not sure what annual fees are nationally, I'd expect in the 100's of millions range (this does not include all the costs to actual do the transplant).
That said, any discussion on this type of topic tends to attract of one liner type attacks from the outrage folks - so not usually worth having.
But folks are thinking about how to dramatically increase donor rates because it is so impactful. Other options have been to pay $100 - 500/year you list as a donor etc which would save incredible numbers of lives at what is relatively low cost. I heard one funny idea which was to do this for folks who get M class licenses (motorcycles). The idea was to both scare them about the risks of riding a motorcycles and of course they really are more likely to be a donor per mile riden (I'm a rider, and the stats are actually terrible in contrast to other things people worry about)
I'm confused- we're talking about post-mortem organ donation... What quality of life are you referring to? Quality of life for living donors? How does that apply in a discussion where the donors have passed away?
More organ donors would be a good thing, give folks $100 one time gift card for signing up - you'd have a ton of folks do that and the cost is tiny.
Maybe $2,500 to help with funeral expenses if you scoop all their organs out and sell them for $2.6M (that's probably average billed charges for a heart / kidney transplant).
Reality - the folks with the money (transplant surgeons, athletic directors in colleges) and their supporters here will NEVER share with the folks running around on courts and fields (college athletes) or providing the organs or whatever. You actually see this pattern over and over, usually with a fair bit of suffering on the side (folks not able to get transplants, injured college athletes etc).
EDIT: Oh and some of you have asked me questions. This platform has now blocked me from responding for some duration, presumably to stop flamebait or troll threads (neither of which is what I was up to). I am happy to continue this conversation over email (in profile) or alternatively I can have a vaccinated representative meet you in person in San Francisco to discuss over coffee.
p.s - see if my profile, or the link on my profile catches your attention.
Not everything in life is a transaction where you're either the winner or the loser. Trying to measure things in that manner will lead you to lose out on a lot of joy.
If someone is going to harvest my Organs and get paid $800K+ per year (California Transplant Surgeon's probably average $750K and some are making $2-3M/year) it's really hard to swallow your and their morally superior tone.
I think that, in the long run, it's pretty immoral to throw table scraps at the donors since it'll create some very perverse market incentives to make certain your organ isn't "being wasted" on some penniless orphan somewhere.
I decided to leave insane American wages behind for a society that cares more about egalitarianism - that isn't solving the problem but it's the best contribution I can personally make.
I'd prefer not to name specific countries, but there are certain overseas markets with thriving black market organ trades. That is what first came to mind when OP expressed the desire that his family be compensated for his organs. Considering some of these cultures have arguably similar existing customs (e.g. intentionally killing a pedestrian that you have accidentally injured but offering the family a large sum of money in exchange for silence) what the OP stated may not be considered unreasonable to someone looking at the world through that lens.
Folks, this a joke. Take it easy.
Organ donation is a very sensitive subject since it can be viewed as losing the coherence of all that remains of someone, but the benefits to others can be extreme. This particular story involved someone getting a heart transplant and, while it was surely a loss that this individual died, after they died they enabled another person who had a limited lease on life to get a lot more time out of something that would have decayed in the ground or be cremated.
Where I'm from they're gonna ask my family for confirmation regardless. Fortunately for me they're okay with it.
Genuinely curious.
I don't find any comfort in visiting the gravesites of relatives, either. Whatever made them what they were isn't there. My father once told me that a dead body is like a house with nobody home. That's how I feel about it, too.
It never occurred to me that the American healthcare system is so ruthless that even if someone dies your family has to pay for your care. How absolutely cruel and awful.
I think for the same reason that your family gets control of your assets. Neither transfer is deserved, but if you allow one then you have to also allow the other.
If no will is drawn up, the estate will be transferred to the next-of-kin after all debts are settled.
Debts don't get passed on but they can eliminate the value of estates being transferred.
I think it's perfectly legitimate to question whether any assets or debts should be transferred on death but right now society is such that some people will be depending on that inheritance since they're inheriting the roof that they've been living under all their life.
The private one has the shortest waiting times and doctors are assigned less patients.
Some things that have happened to me in the private system and I didnt like were:
- Having to pay my bill about two hours after waking up from anesthesia. Literally signing the credit card receipts while on my hospital bed.
- Another time, having to sign an IOU before being admitted, on the emergency room bed.
- One of my doctors throwing away all my medical records, because "they were old and took too much space".
Death in America is pretty darn expensive.
Edit: I'd clarify something - in the US (like almost everywhere) debt cannot be inherited alone. An estate can be declared bankrupt when someone dies and then debtors are limited to just taking chunks out of the estate to the best of their ability - but if shared property is held by the deceased then it can cause serious harm to inheritors. My favorite example is a multi-generational house which can force inheritors into debt to keep the roof over their head.
In Poland(where I'm from) it can. When my father died I basically had to make a choice within a few weeks of his death - either refuse the inheritance entirely, or accept it with all his known and unknown debts. The second options meaning that if someone comes to me in 10 years time saying "hey I have this paper signed by your dad 20 years ago saying he owes me a million dollars" well, I now legally owe this person a million dollars. There is no concept of an estate of the deceased that gets settled first before any inheritance is given out(if anything remains). No, you have to make a choice whether you accept everything(including debts) or literally nothing at all. And you have to make the choice quickly because you cannot manage anything owned or related to the deceased(their bank accounts, mortgages etc) until you make the decision.
However, some states have laws that require adult children to pay the debts of their parents should they end up in a nursing home or similar.
I don't know if my organs will be used when I die, but I sure hope so. There's some sort of zen feeling knowing that my death may result in someone's life being saved or made easier. The decision was quite easy to make. That initial talk with my family was a bit of an awkward subject to bring up, but that's about the only unpleasant side to it.
I think it's the right default, most people won't mind donating and those who do are generally more motivated to fill out the opt out docs.
That's a contradiction. If it's mandatory, it's not a choice.
What makes you feel you have the right to tell others they should be forced to donate their organs?
Where I live, one must state organ donor preference when obtaining a driver's license. I believe the default answer is no if you choose not to choose.
https://themakermom.com/2020/02/isaac-moldofsky-mom-eulogy.h...
My father was the recipient of a lung transplant. It saved his life and enabled him to meet all of his grandchildren. We are forever grateful to the donor that allowed Dad to live.
I have to say that it was comforting to know he saved lives. We got to meet two of the families of the people he saved. One was a Palestinian family, who came to visit us and were really wonderful given the circumstances. The other one we met was a 12 year old boy who got a kidney, and as far as I know is still alive and kicking with part of my dad in him. That's incredible.
None of this makes up for how awful losing my dad was, but knowing it also did some good in this world is a tiny comfort.
Anyone know any good resources?
https://instagram.com/kevinsjourneytolivertransplant, https://www.facebook.com/kmprue/
https://www.ynhh.org/services/transplantation/become-an-orga...
Also this article was too mellow for my taste.
[1] https://www.uts.edu.au/about/faculty-science/after-facility/...
It feels selfish to not write just because I can’t get out of my own way emotionally — but what can you possibly say?
Just say, "Thank you." It doesn't need to be long and complex: "I'm sorry for your loss; but, I id like you know that your son's/daughter's heart has given our daughter a second chance. Thank you."
Don't over think it. You'll never get it "perfect."