National campaign for organ donation launched in Oman

Muscat: The Omani Association for Organ Donation on Tuesday outlined its national media campaign aimed to raise public awareness about organ donation.

Through the “Shifa” application of the Ministry of Health, the campaign targets the registration of 100,000 donors in its first year.

This was unveiled during a press conference held by the Omani Association for Organ Transplantation.

Dr. Noreen Yousef Al Balushi, Liver and Pancreas Surgery Consultant, specialist in Organ Transplants, President of the Omani Association for Organ Transplantation, said that the campaign targets all age groups.

The campaign is being conducted through various media channels, including print press, audio and visual media and electronic platforms, she added. It seeks to use community events as a starting point to spread the culture of organ donation, she explained.

“During the first year of the campaign, we seek to cover a large number of cases of organ failure and to build a special centre for organ transplants,” Said Dr. Noreen.

She pointed out that the campaign will focus on the values of humanity, social solidarity, transparency and commitment to institutional and individual responsibility. Dr. Noreen hopes that the campaign will develop into a national drive and restore hope to many patients.

Meanwhile, Dr. Neven Ibrahim Al Kalbani, Head of the Organ Transplant Department at the Royal Hospital, member of the National Committee for Organ and Tissue Transplantation, told Oman News Agency (ONA) that, so far 24 liver transplants and 325 kidney transplants have been conducted.

However, a large number of patients awaiting kidney transplants and surviving on dialysis stands at 2,300 patients. The positive side is that the number of people registered for organ donation after death through the Ministry of Health’s “Shifa” application amounts to 8,000.

Recently, the Royal Hospital, represented by the Department of Organ Transplantation, launched an educational electronic application for organ transplantation codenamed (Your Donation is Life—No. 8).

The application, which is the first one of its kind in the Arab world, is designed to provide all information related to organ transplantation. It takes the number “8” to indicate that an organ donor can save 8 lives.

The educational electronic application is launched as a measure to correct some misconceptions about organ donation. It will be a reliable source in this aspect.