Hamad Medical Corporation’s Qatar Organ Donation Centre (Hiba) has added more than 23,000 new organ donors during its campaign this year, taking the total number of donors registered with it to 43,000 so far.
The number of nationals and expatriates pledging to donate organs has surged following the noble gesture of HH Sheikha Moza bint Nasser, chairperson of Qatar Foundation, registering herself as a potential donor in 2012. HH Sheikha Moza’s gesture generated immense interest in the society, giving a great fillip to the organ donation drive in the country.
Hiba officials said yesterday that there were plans to set up permanent booths at shopping malls to promote organ donation. The donors during Ramadan Organ Donation Awareness Campaign 2014 were from both locals and expatriates.
According to statistics provided by the donor registry at Hiba, the donors included 9,465 from India, 2,935 from Bangladesh, 2,803 from the Philippines, 2,482 from Nepal, 2,383 from Sri Lanka, 1,347 from Arab countries, including Qatar, and 632 from Pakistan.
The 40-day campaign, which reached out to Qatar residents and citizens to “give the gift of life” and register as an organ donor, was carried out by more than 450 Hiba trained staff in 12 different malls across Qatar.
Hiba director Dr Riadh Fadhil said: “This impressive increase in the number of registration reflects the great increase in the awareness of organ donation in Qatar and this in effect has reflected positively on the number of actual donation and transplants done in the country this year.”
Dr Fadhil said: “The multinational and multi-linguistic Hiba team has enabled Hamad Medical Corporation to optimise the communication with the diverse communities in Qatar and allowed us to deliver the message to the public with great effectiveness.
“We now have 43,000 registrations from 108 nationalities. This represents almost 5% of the eligible population of Qatar which is a great achievement for the registry that started less than two years ago.”
According to Dr Fadhil, Hiba is considering collaborations with the shopping malls in Qatar to make the organ donation campaign booths permanent.
Hiba representatives spent six hours each day of the campaign educating the public about organ donation and its benefits as well as addressing any concerns or queries they had. This year’s campaign gave the public an opportunity to register on the spot and receive their organ donor card at the same time.
Organ transplantation can significantly enhance the quality of life for someone living with chronic organ failure. The organs from deceased donors, can be the only source of survival for the recipients. A deceased organ donor can save up to eight lives. It is also possible to donate a kidney or part of the liver to a relative or someone dear, while the donor is alive.
Hiba was opened in 2011 and since then it has been conducting an organ donation drive every year. The multi-organ transplant facility offers kidney, liver and pancreas transplantation and technical procedures to facilitate donation of these vital organs from related live donors as well as dead donors.
