Willamette High student helps create bill to encourage organ donation

Jarod Doerner, in his Boy Scout uniform, appeared Monday before the House Health Care Committee. His voice was heard because he received a donated heart three years ago.

Doerner, 16, helped create House Bill 4019, a bill brought by Rep. Julie Fahey (D-Eugene). The bill, part of Doerner’s Eagle Scout service project, would designate the second week of April each year as Organ, Eye and Tissue Donor Appreciation Week. The bill would also create the Oregon Gifts of Life Award for families of organ donors.

“I’m paying it forward because a heart transplant meant a lot to me,” said Doerner, a student at Willamette High School in the Bethel School District. “I will do whatever it takes to get it passed.”
During the short session, legislators are allowed only a limited number of bills, but Fahey said she thought it was important to spread the word about organ donation to save lives.
“I was very excited to have the chance to help Jarod with this bill,” she said. “I think it’s important for Oregonians to feel comfortable approaching their representatives in government with public policy ideas.”

HB 4019 moved out of committee Wednesday and is scheduled for a House vote on Friday, Feb. 9.

Jarod Doerner, 16, testifies Monday before the House Health Care Committee in support of House Bill 4019 to increase the awareness of the need for organ donors. Doerner received a transplanted heart at age 13. (Photo by Jake Arnold, OSBA)

Doerner became sick at age 12 with an enlarged heart and had a transplant at 13. The donor who saved Doerner also helped seven other people, according to the information the family was given.
A single donor can help more than 75 people, according to the bill.  As many as eight organs can be donated – heart, liver, small intestines, two kidneys, two lungs and pancreas – as well as cornea, bone, skin, heart valves and connective tissue. In 2016, 83 organ donors from Oregon gave more than 250 transplanted organs, and 2,291 tissue and cornea donations went to 80,353 people, according to the bill.

HB 4019 is important for raising awareness about both the need for and the value of organ donation, said Leslie Brock, Donate Life Northwest executive director. Donate Life registers and educates residents of Oregon and southwest Washington about organ donation.

People can register as donors starting at age 15, and Donate Life offers a high school curriculum called Go Recycle Yourself. Donate Life provides readings, lesson plans, activities and stories about donation that can be used in health, science, leadership or driver’s education classes.

“The more people we can register, it gives hope to people on the waiting list,” Brock said.

About 74 percent of Oregon adults are registered as donors, among the highest rates in the nation, according to Michael Seely, executive director of the Pacific Northwest Transplant Bank. But Oregon still has more than 800 people on a waiting list, and nationally about 20 people a day die waiting for an organ donation, according to the United Network for Organ Sharing.

For the Doerner family, the statistics became personal.

“I always had organ donation on my license,” said Dan Doerner, Jarod’s father, “but I never knew anything about it until he got sick.”

- Jake Arnold, OSBA
jarnold@osba.org