Multi-Organ Transplant Program

News Coverage

Welcome to the Multi-Organ Transplant Program news coverage centre. Please select from the headlines below to read the full press releases or newspaper article.

Members of the Media are invited to visit the LHSC Media Room.

Most Recent Headlines

November 9, 2011 - Londoners encouraged to keep donating organs: Meeting Thursday to discuss heart advancements

London's organ donation rates are higher than the national average, but "we can do better," says the organizer of an information evening Thursday emphasizing advances in heart transplantation methods and technology.

September 14, 2011 - Walking from London to Windsor for organ donations (video)

Tom Awad, 70, was running out of time but since his liver transplant nine years ago he’s been walking to create awareness for organ donation. Awad, for the fifth consecutive year, is making the four-day trek from London’s University Hospital to Windsor.

June 30, 2011 - New Transplant Tool: Smartphone images of donor organs can speed critical consultations

Scalpel? Check. Sutures and sponges? Check. Smartphone? Check. Smartphones may become a must for London surgeons retrieving organs for a transplant after the camera on a Blackberry Bold was used out-of-town to surgically investigate a problematic liver needed by a patient dying in London.

June 27, 2011 - Transplant: The Greatest Gift

Short video (3:38) developed by London Health Sciences Foundation, featuring a patient who needed a heart-liver transplant and his surgeons, Dr. Neil McKenzie and Dr. William Wall.

December 22, 2010 - Take heart, tiny pump a big hit

Terry Elliott says it was a step of faith for him when he decided to have a tiny pump threaded through an artery and into his failing heart. It was the first time London surgeons used the new device, described as the world's smallest heart pump.

September 15, 2010 - Healthy, active transplant recipient celebrates life

Eight years ago Tom Awad was running out of time. With a failed liver and his kidneys in trouble, Awad's only hope was an organ transplant. "I was deathly ill," Awad said Wednesday as he prepared to set off on his fourth Gift of Life Relay Walk from London to Windsor to pay tribute to organ donors and raise money for University Hospital and Hotel-Dieu Hospital in Windsor.

August 22, 2010 - Transplant winners

Joanna Mitchell would watch her daughter's every breath. At any moment, she knew it could be the baby's last because of her enlarged heart. Fast forward, literally, and there is little Ryley Mitchell running down the track. Mom, on the sidelines, is bursting with pride and joy. "That was one of the most amazing things. I watch her and I'm in tears because she shouldn't have been here," Mitchell says. Ryley, 5, a heart transplant recipient competed at the Canadian Transplant Games in Quebec City as the youngest participant.

April 22, 2010 - Organ need outstrips supply
With the highest organ donation rate in Canada, it'll be a challenge to push the numbers higher in the London region, according to the co-director of the multi-organ transplant program at London Health Sciences Centre.

The London area has an organ donation rate of 24 per million people. The Canadian average is 13 to 14 per million. "The London region is equivalent to every top performing world in the country, including the United States and much of Europe, apart from Spain which has 30 to 33 per million. What it shows is London is outstanding," said Jevnikar.

April 19, 2010 - Garden of Life Celebration
London Health Sciences Centre is pleased to help raise awareness for National Organ & Tissue Donation Awareness Week (April 18-25) through a celebration of the Transplant Program's Garden of Life on Tuesday, April 20, 2010 at 3:00pm. This Garden is dedicated to organ donors. While serving as a tribute to donors and their families, it also symbolizes the chance for new life as a result of organ and tissue donation.

March 3, 2009 - Research gets cash transplant
Jevnikar, who was named the Canadian Institutes of Health Research clinical research chair in transplantation, said patients such as Davis drive his research team. "There are a lot of patients like Mr. Davis who need transplants and have not been able to get transplants," he said. The money from CIHR and Wyeth Pharmaceuticals will mean transplant research efforts will be increased at the Schulich School of Medicine and Dentistry at Western with more researchers hired.

December 31, 2008 - Londoners named to Order of Canada
Two Londoners - a surgeon who performed Canada's first successful liver transplant, and a scientist who raised the climate-change flag long before Al Gore did - are receiving the country's highest civilian honour.

July 12, 2008 - Transplant trailblazers

Four women, four transplants, one surgeon - and 100 years of extra life. The first four Canadian women to survive liver transplants have plenty of reasons to celebrate today, 25 years later. A look back on the pioneering surgery that saved them and put London on the map.

June 26, 2008 - Three international Telly Awards

New York City: On Air Productions has won three bronze Tellys for the video ‘One Life … Many Gifts’ which is part of an educational high-school program about donation and transplantation.

February 12, 2008 - Torch travels for transplants

London, Ontario: Canadian high school students carry torch around Canada to raise organ and tissue donation awareness.

Archived Coverage

August 16, 2007 - Ontario needs more organ donors
Toronto: Over 1700 patients in this province are waiting for a life-saving transplant. That is why we have introduced a new organ donation strategy that removes some of the barriers that make it difficult for people to take that courageous step to donate. Our made-in-Ontario strategy will help to increase the rate of organ donations on a number of fronts.

August 11, 2007 - Organ donation: Ultimate gift of life
In 1984, Dr. Cal Stiller, then chief of the multi-organ transplant program at University Hospital, addressed a meeting of the London Foundation. He told about a 14-year-old boy who had died because a donor heart could not be found in time to save his young life. Stiller said there was an urgent need to educate the public, as well as the medical profession, and how if lives were to be saved, there had to be a change in the system used for transplantation.

August 4, 2007 - Transplant program goes across Ontario
A program pioneered in London to increase transplant organ donations is being expanded across the province in a bid to save more lives. "It's great news," said Dr. Bill Wall, director of the Multi-Organ Transplant Program at London Health Sciences Centre. The education program, first launched at Central secondary school in London as a pilot project in 2000-2001, includes information about organ and tissue donation and the benefits of transplantation in the school curriculum.

July 7, 2007 - Insurance fears may stop organ donations
Thinking of donating an organ to a loved one but worried your insurance company may want an arm and leg if you do? You're not alone, preliminary research by a London kidney specialist suggests.

May 1, 2007 - This is something special

Tom Awad gives thanks for his transplant with a 200-kilometre walk. For five days, Tom Awad gave something back to a family who had helped save his life. Awad, 65, and his brother Roger, 64, walked from Windsor to London to pay tribute to the person who kept him alive by signing an organ donor card. "I wanted to do something special to pay tribute to my donor's family," said Tom Awad, who had a liver transplant in November 2002. "This is something special."

April 24, 2007 - Toddler's need highlights drive for organ donations
Imagine your toddler's infectious giggle, hilarious imagination or adoring eyes. Imagine the day-to-day crises of potty training and sleeping through the night. Imagine the child could die without a liver transplant. A Woodstock mother doesn't have to imagine any of that - it's her life. This week - National Organ and Tissue Donor Awareness Week - Nicole Lalonde wants to introduce people to her life. Because once people meet her son Jack, she knows they'll realize the importance of organ donation.