Clinical Pathways for Organ Donation
This area has been developed to provide healthcare professionals throughout the UK with a single access point to comprehensive educational resources and information on complex processes in organ donation.
Contracted by the NHS, organ donation pathways are related to deceased donation and can be used for teaching for all healthcare professionals working in areas with donation potential, providing a best practice operational guide for those units where donation is not a frequent occurrence.
A committed group of Subject Matter Experts involved in designing the Professional Development Programme Masterclass for NHSBT, anaesthetics and nursing professionals covering the UK developed the pathways, which can be accessed by any healthcare professional as well as members of the public.
Access the Map of Medicine pathways here:
The pathways are designed to be view online however, Pdf files of the pathways can be downloaded via the following links:
Pathway 1
Neurological Determination of Death (Brain-stem Death), Adult
Pathway 2
Donation after Brain-stem Death, Adult
Pathway 3
Donation after Cardiac Death, Adult
Pathway 4
Donor Identification in Emergency Medicine
Pathways have been reviewed by professional bodies including representatives from the following organisations:
- Royal College of Anaesthetists
- Intensive Care Society
- College of Emergency Medicine
- NHS Blood and Transplant
- British Association of Critical Care Nurses
- Department of Health
- British Transplantation Society
Sincere thanks goes to the immeasurably important contributions made to the development of these pathways by the following subject matter experts:
Royal College of Anaesthetists: Julian Bion
Intensive Care Society: Kevin Gunning and Saxon Ridley
College of Emergency Medicine: Brodie Paterson
British Transplantation Society: Simon Bramhall
The Department of Health: Chris Rudge
British Association of Critical Care Nurses: Kathy Dalley
Donation after Cardiac Death: Paul Glover, Gerlinde Mandersloot, Joyce Stuart, Chris Watson, Ros O'Sullivan
Diagnosis of Death: Alex Manara, Dale Gardiner, Jackie Brander
Donor Management: Dermot Mckeown, Paul McAndrew, Andrew Broderick, Liz Waite
Donation in the Emergency Department: Francis Andrews, Paula Aubrey, Teressa Tymkewycz, Trish Burton
Donor Identification, referral and consent /authorisation (including Cultural Issues): Ella Poppitt, Gurch Randawa
Legal Issues Relating to Organ Donation: David Price, Chris Danbury
General advise and expertise: Mark Patten, Michelle Tyler, Marian Ryan, Dan Aldridge
Pam Niklin from Map of Medicine for technical guidance
Map of Medicine is helping the NHS respond to the challenge of delivering high quality care in the current environment. Map of Medicine is a visual representation of evidence-based, practice-informed pathways. A key tool for clinically-led service improvement programmes, the Map has been shown to improve patient outcomes and lower healthcare delivery costs.
All NHS staff in England and Wales have access to the Map. For more information visit www.mapofmedicine.com.