donor

1. Med any person who voluntarily gives blood, skin, a kidney etc., for use in the treatment of another person

2. Law

a. a person who makes a gift of property

b. a person who bestows upon another a power of appointment over property

3. Chemistry the atom supplying both electrons in a coordinate bond

4. Physics an impurity, such as antimony or arsenic, that is added to a semiconductor material in order to increase its n-type conductivity by contributing free electrons

Collins Discovery Encyclopedia, 1st edition © HarperCollins Publishers 2005

donor

[′dō·nər]

(solid-state physics)

An impurity that is added to a pure semiconductor material to increase the number of free electrons. Also known as donor impurity; electron donor.

The following article is from The Great Soviet Encyclopedia (1979). It might be outdated or ideologically biased.

Donor

in medieval and Renaissance art and sometimes in the art of later periods, a representation of the builder of the church holding a model of the structure in his hands or of the patron who had ordered the painting, more rarely, sculpture or work of decorative applied art. The donor usually stands before Christ and the Virgin Mary or the saints.

Donor

a person giving his own blood for transfusion, or tissue (for example, skin) or an organ (for example, a kidney) for transplantation in a patient (the recipient). At the present stage of science the most widely found form of donation is blood donation. In the USSR donation is a voluntary act. Any healthy (according to a special medical examination), physically mature person 18 years of age and older can become a donor. The giving of blood is harmless for the donor. The health of the donor is protected, and in the USSR the donors have benefits. They are permitted to leave work with pay in order to give blood, and after giving blood they receive a day off with pay from the institution where they are employed. Donors are the first to receive permits to stay at sanatoriums and rest homes. The Executive Committee of the Red Cross and Red Crescent has established an award for donors, the badge Honorary Donor of the USSR.

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References in periodicals archive

"Financial Incentives for Organ Procurement: Ethical Aspects of Future Contracts for Cadaveric Donors." Adopted December 1993, updated June 1994.

An evaluation of financial incentive policies for organ donations in the United States

The clinical trial of antilymphocyte globulins conducted by the Sydney University group in the early 1970s proved beneficial (Antilymphocyte globulin in patients with renal allografts from cadaveric donors. Late results of a controlled trial (Sheil et al.

Early days in renal transplantation at Sydney Hospital 1967-1983

Counter arguments have also been advanced: the current solicitation does not threaten the hierarchy system from the existing waiting list because the latter one regards only the organs from cadaveric donors, which are treated as a community resource; alternatively, there is no system to regulate the donation from living people, except legal prohibitions in particular situations.

Ethical and legal aspects of unrelated living donors in Romania

The medical professionals in the transplant community and the thousands of persons awaiting organ transplant continue to depend on the altruism of cadaveric donors and their family members.

Financial incentives for organ donation

Estimates suggest that we are presently harvesting only about half of the potential number of cadaveric donors. And second, the opportunity cost of cadaveric organ donation is quite low for most potential donors.

The Failure of U.S. Organ Procurement Policy: "how many deaths will it take 'til we know that too many people have died?"

(34) UNOS data for 2001 indicate that, on average, cadaveric donors yield 1.35 kidneys, 0.36 hearts, and 0.77 livers.

Inefficiency in cadaveric organ procurement

represents about one-third of the potential number of donors, the demand for organs is not likely to be met from cadaveric donors. Nevertheless, this should not stop efforts to increase the efficiency of OPOs.

Potential organ-donor supply and efficiency of organ procurement organizations

However, he pointed out that their families also should cooperate with the authorities to harvest the organs from live or cadaveric donors. "You should be willing to donate your organs, because one day you may be wanting for an organ for your own recovery from someone else," Shaheen said.

New program to boost organ donation

En bloc kidney transplantation from pediatric cadaveric donors to adult recipients.

Doppler ultrasound evaluation of renal transplants

It is also intended for use to screen organ donors when serum and plasma specimens are obtained while the donor's heart is still beating and in testing blood specimens to screen cadaveric donors.

FDA approves second test to screen for parasite that causes Chagas disease

Furthermore, there are clearly issues involved with living donors not present with cadaveric donors. For instance, there is a question of the potential health risks incurred by the living donor and time missed from work.

Kidney transplants and the shortage of donors: is a market the answer?

ANNA and members of the transplant community are unable to know with certainty if financial incentives will increase the number of cadaveric donors or if such incentives will act as a deterrent to donation.

Financial incentives for organ donation