The OPO must have written protocols for donor evaluation and management and organ placement and recovery that meet current standards of practice and are designed to maximize organ quality and optimize the number of donors and the number of organs recovered and transplanted per donor.

(a) Potential donor protocol management.

(1) The medical director is responsible for ensuring that potential donor evaluation and management protocols are implemented correctly and appropriately to ensure that potential donors are thoroughly assessed for medical suitability for organ donation and clinically managed to optimize organ viability and function.

(2) The OPO must implement a system that ensures that a qualified physician or other qualified individual is available to assist in the medical management of a potential donor when the surgeon on call is unavailable.

(b) Potential donor evaluation. The OPO must do the following:

(1) Verify that death has been pronounced according to applicable local, State, and Federal laws.

(2) Determine whether there are conditions that may influence donor acceptance.

(3) If possible, obtain the potential donor's medical and social history.

(4) Review the potential donor's medical chart and perform a physical examination of the donor.

(5) Obtain the potential donor's vital signs and perform all pertinent tests.

(c) Testing. The OPO must do the following:

(1) Arrange for screening and testing of the potential donor for infectious disease according to current standards of practice, including testing for the human immunodeficiency virus.

(2) Ensure that screening and testing of the potential donor (including point-of-care testing and blood typing) are conducted by a laboratory that is certified in the appropriate specialty or subspecialty of service in accordance with part 493 of this chapter.

(3) Ensure that the potential donor's blood is typed using two separate blood samples.

(4) Document potential donor's record with all test results, including blood type, before organ recovery.

(d) Standard: Collaboration with transplant programs.

(1) The OPO must establish protocols in collaboration with transplant programs that define the roles and responsibilities of the OPO and the transplant program for all activities associated with the evaluation and management of potential donors, organ recovery, and organ placement, including donation after cardiac death, if the OPO has implemented a protocol for donation after cardiac death.

(2) The protocol must ensure that:

(i) The OPO is responsible for two separate determinations of the donor's blood type;

(ii) If the identity of the intended recipient is known, the OPO has a procedure to ensure that prior to organ recovery, an individual from the OPO's staff compares the blood type of the donor with the blood type of the intended recipient, and the accuracy of the comparison is verified by a different individual;

(iii) Documentation of the donor's blood type accompanies the organ to the hospital where the transplant will take place.

(3) The established protocols must be reviewed regularly with the transplant programs to incorporate practices that have been shown to maximize organ donation and transplantation.

(e) Documentation of beneficiary information. If the intended beneficiary has been identified prior to recovery of an organ for transplantation, the OPO must have written documentation from the OPTN showing, at a minimum, the intended organ beneficiary's ranking in relation to other suitable candidates and the recipient's OPTN identification number and blood type.

(f) Donation after cardiac death. If an OPO recovers organs from donors after cardiac death, the OPO must have protocols that address the following:

(1) Criteria for evaluating patients for donation after cardiac death;

(2) Withdrawal of support, including the relationship between the time of consent to donation and the withdrawal of support;

(3) Use of medications and interventions not related to withdrawal of support;

(4) Involvement of family members prior to organ recovery;

(5) Criteria for declaration of death and the time period that must elapse prior to organ recovery.

(g) Organ allocation. The OPO must have a system to allocate donated organs among transplant patients that is consistent with the rules and requirements of the OPTN, as defined in §486.320 of this part.

(h) Organ placement. The OPO must develop and implement a protocol to maximize placement of organs for transplantation.

[71 FR 31046, May 31, 2006, as amended at 79 FR 27156, May 12, 2014]