- Organ Donation -
"TELL YOUR FAMILY YOUR WISHES"
One cause that Julia
felt very strongly about was organ donation. She put the sticker for organ donation
on the back of her driver's license before she ever put it in her wallet. She
could not understand why everyone didn't do it. She said, "Dad, it's a
no brainer! If one person doesn't need something and it could help someone else
to live, why would they not give that gift?”
A critical aspect of being willing to be an organ donor is to share that decision
with one’s own family members. They are the ones who would be consulted
by the medical professionals before such a donation were made. One convenient
way to notify family members of willingness to be a donor is to complete and
distribute copies of the following notification form, which was developed by
DONATE LIFE. Click here to download
it.
Donate Life, California
Organ and Tissue Donor Registry, California’s first online donor database,
was launched last April, and had 100,000 registrants in just its first four
months. Previously, Californians could indicate their desire to donate organs
and tissue by signing a card or placing a pink sticker on their driver’s
license, but if that preference was not specified in a will, it often went unheeded.
Now a central registry greatly expedites these critical gifts of life. The Donate
Life California Registry is available online at http://www.donateLIFEcalifornia.org.
Additionally, as of July 1, 2006, the California Department of Motor Vehicles partnered with the new Donate Life California Organ and Tissue Donor Registry. Under the new law, the California DMV now captures donor decisions of licensed drivers on new and renewal license applications, and electronically shares that information with the Donate Life California registry.
At a ceremony in Washington D.C., Julia's parents
were presented with a medal by the U.S. Surgeon General honoring Julia's gift
of sight and life to others. That medal, shown at left, is now embedded in her
headstone, reflecting Julia's fierce advocacy of organ donation.
