Organ transplant improvements, demands draw increasing attention

Abstract

National Organ Donation Awareness Week, as proclaimed by President Reagan, begins April 22. The new American Council on Transplantation plans to use the occasion to heighten physician and public awareness of the need to increase availability of human organs for transplantation. A national public relations firm is contributing the services of some of its Washington, DC, staff. The council itself is an outgrowth of recommendations from a workshop convened by the Surgeon General of the Public Health Service, C. Everett Koop, MD (<i>JAMA</i>[MEDICAL NEWS] 1983;250:2103 and 455-457). Members held their first formal meeting earlier this year and named Gary E. Friedlaender, MD, president for 1984. Friedlaender, who is associate professor, Department of Surgery (orthopedics section), Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Conn, will be succeeded next January by Franklin D. McDonald, MD. McDonald is professor of medicine and vice-chair, Department of Internal Medicine, Wayne State University School of