Case Module 4: Organ Transplantation and Many Ethical Issues

Case Module 4
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Case Module 4
1 History records show that there were early trials of organ and tissue transplantations
although the practice was not so much developed. In their article “History of deceased organ donation, transplantation, and organ procurement organizations” Howard, Cornell and Cochran state that the archeological, historic, and religious records show that organ and tissue transplantation dates back to the earlier centuries (Howard, Cornell & Cochran, 2012). Earlier physicians took their chances and possible risks transplanting tissues and organs for their patients. Some of the physicians themselves received organs from their parents. Tissue and organ transplantation started by the previous physicians trying to transplant tissues from the buttocks to the chins. Today physicians are transplanting organs such as kidneys and hearts from one person to another to save lives. The replacement of tissues from the buttocks to the chins or from one person to another opened a new way of saving lives.
2 Organ transplantation involves many ethical issues and one of them is the concept of
Distributive justice. The concept is about how to divide the available resources fairly. In organ transplantation, the deceased human body is considered to be a resource and there are many organs that can be transplanted. As explained in, Ethics of Organ Transplantation, publication by the University of Minnesota's Center for Bioethics, Paul, Valapour, Bartels, Abbott-Penny, Kahn, state that, “There are not enough organs available for everyone who needs one.” The concept states that there is no “right” way that can be used to distribute the organs but there are so many ways that a donor can use to justify when donating an organ (Brenda, Valapour, Ba...