Just a few patients suffering kidney or liver failure received organ transplantation in Vietnam, said the Ministry of Health and Organ Transplantation Association at a meeting to call on people to donate their organs in Hanoi.
According to the Ministry of Health, the country has 14 medical facilities which are able to perform organ transplantation and Vietnamese doctors' skill in transplantation is as good as their counterparts in foreign countries. However, the sector is in severe need of organ supply while the demand is increasing drastically.
The main cause of shortage of organ donation is due to people's incorrect awareness of organ donation. In addition, information of organ donation is still limited and not popular among the community.
By statistics, Vietnamese surgeons has so far carried out over 1,011 kidney transplant operations, 37 liver transplant surgeries, 11 heart transplantation, one operation for pancreas transplant and over 1,400 cornea transplantation.
Yet the country has around 6,000 people suffering chronic kidney failure , over 1,500 people with liver failure and more than 300,0000 blind people because of cornea diseases. Around 6,000 of them need a cornea transplant and hundreds of people need organ transplantation operation.
Many patients died while they were waiting for a transplant operation. However many organs from brain death or traffic accidents were not used. It is a big waste causing medical workers' concern.
As a result, the Association for Organ Donation Encouragement and the Vietnam Association of Organ Transplantation were officially set up. Health Minister Nguyen Thi Kim Tien was elected Chairwoman of the Association for Organ Donation Encouragement and Professor Pham Gia Khanh was elected Chairman of the Vietnam Association of Organ Transplantation.
The two associations were established to liaise with other organizations and all sectors to spread information of organ donation all classes of people.
