Does procurement technique or criteria for the declaration of death matter? A survey of public attitudes toward organ donation.

Normothermic regional perfusion (NRP) is a novel organ procurement strategy used for donation after circulatory death (DCD) involving in situ organ perfusion. This cross-sectional survey study assesses US public attitudes toward organ donation and willingness to donate organs after DCD-NRP, standard DCD and after brain death, comparing registered donors (registrants) and non-registered participants (non-registrants). More registrants agreed with having trust in the medical system and registrants were more likely to agree with donation in every scenario. Almost half of respondents agreed that a person must be dead to donate their vital organs. This study found that willingness to donate was associated with donor registration and trust in the medical system. A secondary finding was that there is not universal understanding of the dead donor rule and implications of first-person authorization. Overall, our findings suggest that public support for donation remains strong, and that NRP utilization does not diminish that support.