Organ procurement organization
The body that federal designation puts in charge of recovering organs — and, in practice, whoever telephones the family in the first hours.
What it means
The anatomical gift statutes define it by designation rather than by description: a person designated by the Secretary of the United States Department of Health and Human Services as an organ procurement organization. Each one covers a defined region, and a hospital is required to work with the one covering it.
It is not the hospital, and it is not the funeral provider. That distinction is the useful part of the word, because the call a family receives in the first hours usually comes from this organization rather than from the treating team, and the person calling has a legal role that the doctors do not.
Its authority comes from what the person who died had already recorded — a donor registry entry, a driver's license designation, a document of gift — and only where nothing was recorded does the statutory list of people who may make a gift come into play.
Why it matters
A family that does not know who is calling, or why, is being asked to make a fast decision by a stranger. Knowing the caller has a defined role and a defined question makes the conversation navigable.
It also explains why the answer may not be theirs to give: where the person registered as a donor, the gift is already made and the family is being informed rather than asked.
When you are likely to meet it
- In a telephone call within hours of a death in a hospital.
- In a state's anatomical gift act, which is written around this organization's rights and duties.
- When a family wants to donate and nobody has told them who to ask.