Difficulties with the organ donation process in small hospitals in Germany

The discrepancies between the need and the number of organs donated in Germany lead to a search for the causes of this deficit. In the present study, 78 small hospitals in Germany were interviewed about the difficulties with the organ donation process. Data were acquired by means of a structured telephone interview. No organ donor between 2004 and 2008, was reported by 44% of the participating hospitals while the remaining 56% had >or=1 donor. The main results show that one third of these small hospitals already had difficulties communicating with bereaved relatives about donation. In addition, 31% of the respondents reported problems during the organ removal process and 41% in identifying potential organ donors.