Audience
OPO staff and transplant hospital staff
At-a-glance
An OPTN/UNOS Board-approved project to improve organ offer and acceptance process resulted in changes to DonorNet® and policy in May and June 2018. We updated the system in two releases.
Project timeline
- Phase 1: Reduce time limit to respond to organ offers to one hour
- 4/2/2018: Phase 1 professional education available on UNOS Connect
- 5/2/2018: Phase 1 system and policy changes effective
- Phase 2: Limit the number of organ offer acceptances to two
- 5/2018: Phase 2 professional education available on UNOS Connect
- 6/13/2018: Phase 2 system and policy changes effective
Resources
Access UNOS Connect to help you prepare for the changes
- Board report (explains how the proposal was revised after public comment)
- Fiscal impact statement
- Public comment proposal
- Comments submitted during public comment
Additional Resources
Online help documentation is available. Access Secure Enterprise, then choose DonorNet > Help > Online Help. Search for a specific help topic or use the table of contents.
What members need to do to prepare
Transplant Hospitals
Evaluate your processes for receiving organ offers. If you use third-party vendors to receive organ offers, you will also need to notify your vendors that the time for evaluating and responding to electronic organ offers will be reduced from a total of two hours ( 1 hour to acknowledge offers and 1 hour to enter responses in DonorNet®) to one hour.
OPOs
When the changes take effect, you will need to indicate “organ placed” in DonorNet® immediately to ensure that the proposed organ offer acceptance limit meets its intended goal. You should also review the proposed policy changes to ensure timely and accurate reporting of donor information.
Background
The OPTN/UNOS Organ Procurement Organization (OPO) Committee offered the proposal for public comment in July 2017 and the Board of Directors approved it in December 2017.
This effort aligns with OPTN strategic goal #1: Increase the number of transplants. Specifically, the changes are designed to “help ensure that the right organs get to the right candidates in a timely manner,” to improve the placement of organs and decrease organ discard.
Contact
If you have questions about policy, contact your UNOS Regional Administrator. For technical questions or issues, contact UNOS Customer Service at (800) 978-4334 or [email protected].
