Innovations in organ retrieval pose ethical questions

By Tom Hall,

Teria Rogers, Sam Bermas-Dawes

Published July 30, 2024 at 12:05 PM EDT

Meharry Medical College students Emmanuel Kotey, center, and Teresa Belledent, right, watch as the liver and kidneys are removed from an organ donor June 15, 2023, in Jackson, Tenn. They’re part of a novel pilot program to encourage more Black and other minority doctors-to-be to get involved in the transplant field, increasing the trust of patients of color. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey) — Meharry Medical College students Emmanuel Kotey, center, and Teresa Belledent, right, watch as the liver and kidneys are removed from an organ donor June 15, 2023, in Jackson, Tenn. They’re part of a novel pilot program to encourage more Black and other minority doctors-to-be to get involved in the transplant field, increasing the trust of patients of color.

Tom talks about a controversial practice being employed to harvest organs for transplant from people who have died called Normothermic Regional Perfusion, or NRP.

According to reporting by NPR's Rob Stein, this technique is considered an innovation which produces high quality and less damaged organs for those in need. This innovation is not, however, without ethical concerns.

Dr. Jeffrey Kahn is the Director of the Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics. The Institute produces a podcast, playing god? and he joins Midday to help us understand NRPs.