Collaboration between the intensive care unit and organ donation agency to achieve routine consideration of organ donation and comprehensive bereavement follow-up: an improvement project in a quaternary Australian hospital.

ConclusionsCollaboration between DLSA and the Royal Adelaide Hospital ICU achieved universal consideration of organ donation and high rates of structured bereavement follow-up. Follow-up calls were valued with areas for improvement identified.What is known about this topic?Death in the ICU is associated with significant psychopathology among bereaved family members, and bereavement follow-up is widely recommended. Opportunities to consider organ and tissue donation are commonly missed due to lack of consideration at end of life.What does this paper add?Collaboratively exploring donation and performing bereavement follow-up is feasible with a minimal added resource. Such comprehensive approach to good end-of-life care helps identify aspects of care that could be improved and is associated with an increase in organ and tissue donation rates.What are the implications for practitioners?Collaboration between the ICU and DonateLife achieved mutually beneficial outcomes of understanding the end-of-life experience for family members and timely consideration of organ and tissue donation. This timely consideration potentially identified some missed organ donors and then allowed family members to give feedback on their experience. PMID: 33317686 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]
Source: Australian Health Review - Category: Hospital Management Authors: Tags: Aust Health Rev Source Type: research