Organ donor registration rates rise, but T.O. lagging

Ontarians are heeding the call to register as organ and tissue donors, new numbers reveal.

In the last 12 months, 245,000 people registered to be donors on the province’s database, bringing the overall rate up 1 per cent, to 23 per cent. Toronto also saw a 1 per cent bump, to 14 per cent from 13 per cent, with 40,000 new registrants, reveals the recently updated BeADonor website.

While donor registrants have only been measured at the municipal level for one year, Toronto ranks as one of the lowest in the province, behind other cities including Ottawa (25 per cent), Hamilton (33 per cent) and Sudbury (45 per cent).

Even within the city, the number of registered donors varies widely, from a low of 9 per cent in Scarborough to a high of 23 per cent in the western half of downtown.

The eastern half of downtown reports a registration rate of 22 per cent, followed by Etobicoke at 13 per cent, East York at 12 per cent and York and North York both at 11 per cent.

The small town of Garson, just outside Sudbury, has the best registrants rate in the province — 50 per cent of health-card holders have signed up.

This year’s province-wide figures amount to a 10 per cent growth, once adjustments are made to account for those registered who moved out of the province or died.

“It’s not where we want to be, but they’re going in the right direction,” says Ronnie Gavsie, CEO of Trillium Gift of Life Network, the provincial agency mandated with or- gan and tissue donation and transplantation. It is hard to say exactly why Toronto lags behind the rest of the province, says Gavsie, but it’s a trend other countries report as well, particularly in the U.S. “In general, registration rates in large, cosmopolitan areas are lower than they are in smaller, rural and more homogeneous areas,” she says. Trillium is currently researching the barriers in the GTA. Gavsie credits ServiceOntario employees, who since February have asked those applying for or renewing a driver’s licence, health card or photo ID to register as an organ donor. Five out of six new registrants come from those offices or mail-in registration, Gavsie says. “The face-to-face encouragement and education has proven to be tremendously powerful,” Gavsie says. “The education from ServiceOntario is proving to be the most effective vehicle.” Gavsie also credits organizations that have held registration drives. Last week a drive co-ordinated by the Hospital for Sick Children, University Health Network and St. Michael’s Hospital brought 3,300 new registrants to BeADonor.ca.

Many Ontarians mistakenly believe they are registered donors because they have signed a paper donor card. Donor cards are not effective, as they are not always available when needed.

One out of every six registrations was completed at BeADonor.ca, where it takes two minutes to register consent or check your registration status.

To see more detailed information by neighbourhood within the city, visit www.BeADonor.ca/Toronto. With files from Marco Chown Oved bturnbull@thestar.ca