Organ donation - a reflection
We get lots of information and guidance on the science and practicalities of what we are supposed to do as anaesthetists.
However we get very little information or guidance on how to deal with the emotions that ensue from a highly challenging, stressful and psychologically traumatising profession, in which we see and do things to strangers that most people would rather not think about.
I remember the first time I was assigned the deeply unsettling task of accompanying a patient to theatre for organ donation after cardiac death, and it made me feel a whole lot of things that I wasn't expecting and certainly hadn't been warned about.
This is a reflection on the process of organ donation after circulatory death, presented as a letter to my former self, that I hope provides some comfort.
Dear anaesthetist,
The time will come when you are called upon to perform a unique and morally very challenging task - to assist with organ donation - be that after brainstem death testing, or for the particularly difficult withdrawal of treatment with possibility of donation after cardiac death.
I'm not here to tell you the nuances of either of these processes. I'm simply here to inform you of some of the feelings and emotions that may arise that nobody else warned you about.