Live Organ Donation: Social Context, Clinical Encounter, and the Psychology of Communication

Organ transplantation is increasingly available to the thousands of patients who suffer from end-organ failure. There has been an attendant increase in demand for living donor participation. This combined with a bioethical focus on autonomy increases the burden of decision on donor candidates. The authors review the history of living donor participation in organ transplantation and explore the psychological dynamics of the clinical encounter between donor and transplant surgeon. The field of communication psychology lends to the understanding of coercion and to the importance of donors possessing a status of patient-hood in the classical Hippocratic condition.