Potential availability of transplantable organs and tissues in fatalities from injury and nontraumatic intracranial hemorrhage.

Study of all Vermont and urban Rhode Island trauma fatalities for 1987, and all fatalities in these states from nontraumatic intracranial hemorrhage for 1986 and 1987, identified few potential donors for asystole-sensitive organs, such as heart, lungs, liver, pancreas, and kidneys. It is estimated that nationally there is a maximum potential of about 5000 cadavers per year from these two sources that meet screening criteria for age, duration of survival after event, brain death, and absence of organ damage or important disease. This would yield up to 5000 hearts, livers, and pancreases, perhaps 5-6000 lungs, and up to 10,000 kidneys. However, for tissues that have longer postdeath viability it is estimated that annually at least 60,000 eyes, 22,000 heart valve sets, 29,000 donations of 2 or more long bones per cadaver, and 36,000 skin donations are potentially available from these sources.