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When a terminally ill patient or their family makes the momentous lifesaving decision to donate organs or tissue, UVA Health Prince William Medical Center team members organize a ceremony called an Honor Walk. Team members from all corners of the hospital — along with the patient’s family and friends — line the hallways to pay their respects as the patient makes their final journey through the hospital to the operating room for organ recovery. 

Each Honor Walk ceremony is deeply moving, recognizing the solemn moment and the patient’s noble decision to save or heal the lives of many through organ or tissue donation. Drawing team members from virtually every UVA Health care area — Honor Walks are also a living, breathing representation of the countless people and processes involved in making a single organ transplant procedure successful.  

Spreading Awareness, Inspiring Action

April is National Donate Life Month, raising awareness about organ, eye, and tissue donation. It encourages Americans to register as donors and honors those who have saved lives through the gift of donation. 

According to Donate Life America, there are currently more than 100,000 people in the United States waiting for lifesaving organ transplants, with one person added to the waitlist every eight minutes. Did you know just a single organ donor can:

• Save up to eight lives.
• Restore sight to two people through cornea donation.
• Heal more than 75 lives through tissue donation.

At University Medical Center in Charlottesville, UVA Health offers the only comprehensive transplant center in Virginia, serving the needs of both organ donors and recipients across the state. 

UVA Health Transplant Services

In Northern Virginia and surrounding communities — UVA Health Culpeper, Haymarket, and Prince William Medical Centers work with organ procurement organizations Infinite Legacy and LifeNet Health in support of organ recovery.  The three medical centers play different roles in organ recovery. UVA Health Prince William Medical Center and UVA Health Haymarket Medical Center recover organs, and UVA Health Culpeper Medical Center recovers tissue donations.

“It is important for the community to know about Donate Life Month and for families to have conversations around organ donation,” says Eyad Abdel Latif, RN, MSN, MBA, NEA-BC, LSSGBC, Senior Director, Acute Care Services and Behavioral Health, UVA Health Prince William Medical Center. “When they have that proactive conversation, families can have peace knowing what their family member wants and being able to honor those wishes.”

While crucial among the public, organ donation awareness also is vitally important among UVA Health team members. “Donate Life Month brings so much awareness about this important function that we do as clinicians,” Abdel Latif says. “The earlier we recognize [an opportunity for organ transplant] and coordinate with the organ procurement organization (OPO), the better the chance that most of the gifts are viable. We gather the organ procurement team to say we’re one team in support of this donation, this gift. It’s meaningful work — we’re all connected with this very important purpose and calling.”

Compassion and Coordination

According to Alyssa Caudle, BSN, RN, CCRN, Critical Care Nurse Manager, UVA Health Prince William Medical Center, a successful transplant requires the tireless work of an extensive network of people. As a patient nears the end of life, the care team starts with specific criteria and works with an early procurement team to evaluate if transplantation could be a viable option. 

Often, an OPO such as Infinite Legacy or LifeNet Health then meets with the patient’s family to answer questions and support them during this difficult decision-making process. Once a decision has been made, the UVA Health care team and OPO coordinator work “elbow-to-elbow” to clinically support both the donor and recipient.  

“There are so many hands that touch these individuals’ lives. From our cath lab team — if we’re pursuing heart donation — to our lab team and the amount of information needed to see if that organ would be a good fit for another individual — to respiratory — there are so many people involved who impact this process,” Caudle explains. “It’s not just nursing … there is so much coordination behind the scenes that you don’t see to streamline the entire care process for our patients.”

Once the transplant surgery time is confirmed, the UVA Health care team then works with the family to offer various ways to honor their loved one’s gift of life, such as an Honor Walk or flag raising. At UVA Health Prince William Medical Center, there are flagpoles at the front of the facility on public display. At a flag raising, team members gather with family and friends at the front of the building to hold a moment of silence, say a few words in tribute of their loved one, and raise the Donate Life America flag, which flies for a week honoring the gift of life that took place. In commemoration of National Donate Life Month, the flag has been raised and flown at all UVA Health medical centers throughout April.  

Hope In an Otherwise Dark Time

The organ transplantation process is, by definition, complex and challenging — but it is also an ideal demonstration of UVA Health’s mission of “transforming health and inspiring hope for all Virginians and beyond.”  

Explains Caudle: “Connecting it back to our mission, in the big picture, when you have a family who is really grieving the loss of their loved one, when they can have that element of hope that they’re giving the gift of life to someone else ... it’s very fulfilling as a clinician to know you were able to be a part of that, to give hope to a family in an otherwise very dark time.” 

That sense of purpose resonates across the care team, as many find the organ donation process representative of why they chose healthcare in the first place.  

“The mission of any healthcare worker is to save lives — that’s why we’re in healthcare,” Abdel Latif reminds us. “That mission is really actualized by seeing and being part of this [organ donation] process. Overall, it is a celebration of life."

Read more transplant-related stories at UVA Health:

• Transplant Team Creates a Garden of Pinwheels to Honor Those Who Have Donated Life
• UVA Health Team Member Donates Kidney to Help Father-in-Law
• UVA Health Opens Transplant Clinic in Wytheville
• How Are They Now? UVA Health Team Member Gives Gift of Life — Then Receives One From Long-Time Coworker