World Organ Donation Day

World Organ Donation Day is marked on August 13. The day, as the name suggests, is for raising and creating awareness about organ donation. Many people across the globe have certain apprehensions and misconceptions about the process of organ donation while some are unaware about the huge difference it can make in people's lives.

By definition, organ donation means donating organs that are in healthy condition after a person is dead. Organs such as lungs, kidney, eyes, liver and pancreas can turn out to be life saving for people who are going through chronic illness.

On many occasions, blind persons have got the opportunity to see after their eyes were replaced by a donor's eye. The day aims at sensitising and motivating more and more people towards pledging to donate organs and save others' lives. World's first ever organ transplant was successfully carried out by Doctor Joseph Murray in 1954 in the United States of America.

The living donor organ transplant was carried out between twin brothers Richard Herrick and Ronald Herrick. After the remarkable feat the doctor won the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine in 1990.