By Ashley Mittelmeier, Adrian College communications office
After six weeks of competition, Adrian College and Michigan State University captured the Gift of Life Campus Challenge trophies. The annual organ donor drive involved 20 colleges and universities from across the state, to see which school could sign up the most people to the Michigan Organ Donor Registry.
Adrian College, in its first year competing, had the greatest ratio of donor registrations to student population, with more than 15 percent registering to become organ, tissue and eye donors. Michigan State University recruited the most donor registrants, with 1,246 donor registrations attributed to the school.
In total, the participating schools inspired 4,283 people to join the Donor Registry, offering hope for a second chance at life to the 3,000 Michigan patients waiting for a life-saving organ transplant, and thousands more who need tissue transplants to regain mobility or vision, and to relieve chronic pain. Each donor has the potential to save up to 8 lives through organ donation, and improve the quality of life for 50 more through tissue and cornea donation.
“We are impressed with the enthusiastic support of college students all across the state,” said Richard Pietroski, Gift of Life Michigan CEO. “In a few short weeks they have educated and motivated thousands of Michigan residents to make a generous commitment to saving lives.”
Students on each campus employed a variety of creative methods to inspire students, faculty, staff, alumni and fans to join the Donor Registry. Students staffed donor registry sign-up tables on campus and at sporting events, stuffed information cards into dormitory mailboxes, handed out flyers in classes, put up posters, published newsletter articles, created videos, sent text messages and used social media like Facebook and Twitter.
The Gift of Life Campus Challenge is the largest college-based organ donor drive in the nation, and has been recognized by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services for its success. In its 8 years the Campus Challenge has resulted in more than 28,000 people adding their names to the Michigan Organ Donor Registry.
Since 2007, Michigan residents who join the Donor Registry have a red heart symbol placed on the front of their driver’s license or state ID card. Those who signed up previously, or who signed the back of their license, are asked to update their donor registration to obtain the red heart donor symbol. Joining the Donor Registry takes less than a minute at www.giftoflifemichigan.org. Residents can also join by calling Gift of Life at 800-482-4881 or visiting any Secretary of State branch office.
Gift of Life Michigan is the state’s federally designated full-service organ recovery organization that acts as the intermediary between donors, physicians and hospital staff.
0 comments:
Post a Comment