Shock figures show lack of Yorkshire organ donors as 800 people in county await lifesaving transplants

Hundreds of people in Yorkshire face a long and life-threatening wait for an organ transplant, after it emerged only around 100 people in the county donated organs last year.
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The latest figures show there are approximately 800 people on the transplant waiting list in the county at present. Every day three people nationally die waiting for a transplant.

Average waiting times in Yorkshire for liver transplants are 25 per cent longer than the national average at around 222 days, while the average wait for a kidney transplant in the White Rose is a staggering 1,114 days.

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Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust (LTH), Yorkshire’s leading transplant centre, is urging more residents to sign the NHS Organ Donor Register after only 114 people in the county donated organs in 2014/15.

Dr Simon Flood, a clinical lead for organ donation at LTH, said: “Sadly there are still approximately 800 people in Yorkshire waiting for a transplant. Just one organ donor can transform the lives of up to nine people and if more families felt sure of their loved one’s wishes to be a donor, more lives could be saved.”

The lifesaving actions of the 114 Yorkshire donors gave 294 desperately ill patients organs last year. Nationally around 10,000 people are in need of a transplant.

A donor, someone who agrees to donate their organs to others after death, can help up to nine people by donating their heart, lungs, two kidneys, pancreas, liver and small bowel and can restore the sight of two people by donating their corneas.

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The Leeds Transplant Centre at LTH has been providing complex organ transplants for Yorkshire for over 25 years. It is the third largest liver transplant unit in the UK, a leading centre for ‘live related’ transplants and a regional centre for renal transplants.