Organ donation programs could offer reimbursements under new bill

New legislation introduced in Congress aims to address a shortage of organs for transplants by changing or clarifying 32-year-old rules on what incentives can be offered to living organ donors.

The bill sponsored by Rep. Matt Cartwright, R-Pa., would address the portion of the 1984 National Organ Transplant Act (NOTA), which bans buying or selling organs for “valuable consideration.”

“Confusion about what constitutes valuable consideration has hampered donation by scaring people away from reimbursing living organ donors for things like medical expenses and lost wages,” Cartwright said in a statement.  “Both are legal under NOTA, but the law’s lack of clarity and its criminal penalties have created uncertainty and prevented reimbursements in many cases.”

The legislation would clarify that reimbursing a living donor for expenses related to donating an organ—like travel, lost wages, follow-up care, paperwork or legal costs, or the effects on an insurance policy—wouldn’t fall under the “valuable consideration” definition in the 1984 law.

The proposal also allows for government-run pilot programs to test out the effectiveness of offering non-cash incentives to encourage organ donation.

“You make it something like a pension contribution or an education fund contribution, something that is not transferable,” Cartwright said in an ABC News interview.  

Programs would have to approved by HHS, distribute organs through existing channels, and last no longer than five years.

Those elements of the proposals are opposed by the National Kidney Foundation, which argued the language in the bill is too vague as to what a non-cash benefit could be.

“The Organ Donation Clarification Act of 2016, as written, leaves too much open for misinterpretation and could have the unintended consequence of doing harm to both the donor, and transplant recipient, alike,” the foundation said in a statement.

Cartwright’s office said the legislation is supported by other groups, including the American Medical Association and the American Foundation for Donation and Transplantation.