“For the last year we have not had a single transplant from a living donor, which is terrible“, said in “Face to Face“ Dr. Alexander Simidchiev from “Democratic Bulgaria“.
In the program, he sent an SMS to his daughter, in which he wrote: “If something happens to me, I want to donate my organs. I love you!“
“I'm sending it to her because in this way I take away the responsibility of her having to decide if something happens to me“, explained Simidchiev.
In his words, something so brief takes away the responsibility from our loved ones and makes their decision easier.
“In Bulgaria, about 20% of people, when asked at such a difficult moment for them, say “no“, which does not always coincide with the person's wishes and that is why I want people to be able to do something themselves“, explained Alexander Simidchiev.
By law in our country, anyone who has been diagnosed with brain death can donate organs. However, most doctors ask relatives if the organs can be donated, he explained.
“It is morally and ethical to ask relatives, at the same time the relatives should know. What I will do, together with my colleagues in parliament - because there is an official list for people who refuse to donate. I want to add to this list people who explicitly confirm during their lifetime their desire to donate their organs. Then there is no need to ask relatives“, said Dr. Alexander Simidchiev.
He explained that many people travel abroad to make living donations because in our country there is another problem that prevents and which is not directly related to transplants, namely hospital infections.
„If a person makes such a significant sacrifice to save the life of a loved one, and it fails because a severe infection occurs, from which a person can even die, this makes all efforts meaningless“, said Simidchiev.
„The number of people waiting for a transplant in our country to date is 923. This is about four times more than there are deputies in parliament. That is, each deputy needs to know the problem of four people and know how long they have been waiting. Each of us in our regions has at least four of them. If we have a closer relationship with them, this will be much better“, is the opinion of Dr. Alexander Simidchiev.
He addressed the Ministry of Health with the words that the “Transplantation“ department at the Executive Agency “Medical Supervision“ is not a good organizational form.
“This should be an Executive Agency for Transplantation, as it was before, in order to be able to work and have responsibility“, he said.
According to him, transplants are an easy problem to solve and within a year and a half - two it can be solved.