By AnneMarie Knepper
| Posted: Thursday, April 10, 2008 12:00 am
For the Gazette-Times
ALBANY - Transplant recipient and Albany resident Mary Ray has personally registered more people to be organ donors than any other volunteer in Oregon.
"I would like Albany to stand out in Oregon as a community that is behind organ registration and Donate Life Northwest," she said.
Donate Life Northwest, formerly known as the Oregon Donor Program, promotes organ, eye and tissue donation. It has recognized Ray as its outstanding registry champion volunteer.
Executive Director Mary Jane Hunt said that in the past year, Ray had spoken to 36 groups, staffed 12 donor-designation events, averaged 25-35 registrations per event, and single-handedly brought in more registrations than any other volunteer in the state.
April is National Donate Life Month, and Ray would like as many people as possible to know they could save a life simply by adding a "D" to their driver's license.
There's a been a change, Ray said. When you elect to add a D on your license in Oregon, that automatically puts you on the national registry as a donor. "Up until now, the D only has meant that you intended to be, and somebody else is going to make the (final) decision."
Ray explained that instead of an official asking family members, "They wanted to be a donor, do you wish that to happen?" now they will be informing them, "They have consented to be a donor. That was their wishes."
This is a result of Oregon's adoption of the Uniform Anatomical Gift Act. The act is retroactive. "Any adult who has a D is a consented donor."
Persons younger than 18 may put a D on their license or permit, but in the event of a fatality, the decision to donate is still up to the parents.
Ray knows first-hand the agony of needing an organ and waiting for one to become available.
She received a kidney in 2003 after being on dialysis for 31/2 years.
She had worked in the medical profession as an administrator for doctors' offices prior to going on dialysis. She was active in the Medical Assistants Association in Oregon and California, earning outstanding medical assistant of the year in Orange County in 1992.
"I've met many people who are also waiting for organs and people who have already received them," she said. "What a difference it makes in their life when they have life yet to give."