The Role of the Anesthesia Team in Organ Donation

There isn't a need for in most cases ongoing organ support, there's no circulation to for medications or any really need. In some rare instances when the lungs are going to be recovered for transplant or for research, the deceased donor will need to be re-intubated for a long recruitment and that can be sometimes done by an anesthesiologist. ASA recently updated their guidelines and they're available on their website. They walked through this process pretty carefully and really identified that the role of the anesthesia team should be in helping to facilitate this as leaders in the OR space.