Sweden aims to increase organ donors with new practices

Healthcare professionals in Sweden are working to increase the number of organ donors by making registration easier and expanding how they identify potential donors.

Currently, only 1.9 million of Sweden’s residents have registered their consent for organ donation, with 80 percent of those individuals willing to donate after death. Doctors believe convenience is a key barrier, as many people simply haven’t gotten around to registering despite supporting the practice.

Psychological factors also play a role, as some people avoid thinking about death or worry about how their body will be treated. Healthcare workers are working to address these concerns by explaining the respectful manner in which organs are recovered. While the number of donors dipped last year, it remains relatively high compared to the past decade, with 144 people donating organs so far this year.

Sweden utilizes a system of presumed consent, meaning that if a person hasn't explicitly opted out of organ donation, healthcare providers assume they would want to donate. However, obtaining consent from next of kin is a sensitive and time-consuming process, and healthcare professionals have recently seen a threefold increase in families interpreting a loved one’s wishes as opposing donation.

To address this, Swedish hospitals are adopting a practice used in Spain, where they actively look for potential donors even outside of intensive care units. This new approach, called ICOD, could potentially increase the number of organ donors by 80 per year, representing a 20 to 30 percent increase.