IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/medema/v27y2007i3p243-249.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Should We Promote Organ Donor Registries When So Few Registrants Will End Up Being Donors?

Author

Listed:
  • David H. Howard

    (Department of Health Policy and Management, Emory University, Atlanta, GA, david.howard@emory.edu)

  • Margaret M. Byrne

    (Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, University of Miami, Miami, FL)

Abstract

Background . A major obstacle facing efforts to register organ donors is that the likelihood that any given registrant will die in such a way as to render his or her organs suitable for donation is extremely low. Such policies make sense only if the resources used to sign up an additional donor are proportional to the expected benefits. Methods . Using data on historical donation patterns, estimates of the potential donor supply, and an estimate of the monetary value of an organ donor, the authors calculate the average value to society of a registrant as a function of age at registration. Result . Under a “first-person consent†regime, the value of a registrant ages 18 to 34 years is $1900. The value of registering individuals who have not already registered is even higher because these persons are more likely to become donors. If donor families have the right of refusal, the value of a registrant is substantially less, around $840. Conclusion . Given that most donor registries are fairly limited operations, piggybacking on drivers' license registration and renewal administration, results suggest that registries are cost-effective. Of course, a complete analysis awaits concrete data on the costs of operating registries and attracting new registrants.

Suggested Citation

  • David H. Howard & Margaret M. Byrne, 2007. "Should We Promote Organ Donor Registries When So Few Registrants Will End Up Being Donors?," Medical Decision Making, , vol. 27(3), pages 243-249, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:medema:v:27:y:2007:i:3:p:243-249
    DOI: 10.1177/0272989X07299539
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0272989X07299539
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/0272989X07299539?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Ugur, Z.B., 2013. "From headscarves to donation : Three essays on the economics of gender, health and happiness," Other publications TiSEM 9cfb068c-c08e-47aa-8c44-f, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    2. Zeynep Burcu Ugur, 2015. "Does Presumed Consent Save Lives? Evidence from Europe," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 24(12), pages 1560-1572, December.
    3. Siegel, Jason T. & McManus, Maria D. & Blazek, Danielle R. & Marshburn, Alexander, 2023. "Three-in-1,000 and dynamic norms: A mixed-method investigation of novel appeals for influencing organ donor registration," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 317(C).
    4. Bilgel, Firat, 2020. "State Gun Control Laws, Gun Ownership and the Supply of Homicide Organ Donors," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(C).
    5. Jon Diesel, 2010. "Do Economists Reach a Conclusion on Organ Liberalization?," Econ Journal Watch, Econ Journal Watch, vol. 7(3), pages 320-336, September.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:medema:v:27:y:2007:i:3:p:243-249. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.