Throughout my medical career I have been privileged to regularly come in direct contact with the organ and tissue donation and transplantation process. It is an area filled with dedicated people doing fantastic work. Whether it is the families devastated by the loss of a loved one making the decision to help another family, the committed staff that make the donation process occur, the highly skilled surgeons that operate through the night to perform the transplants, the seriously ill patients that then come back to good health or the scientists who ensure that the whole process can proceed.  Each of them contributes an important element in a highly complex process. 

I have always been impressed and proud to be associated with this group of individuals who have shown a dedication to the life extending and life changing processes of organ and tissue donation and have done much to progress the science and ethics of this area of medicine at a state, national and international level.

Whilst it is a tragedy that transplantation often occurs because of the loss of another's life, the fact that so much good can come from this terrible event is a testament to the combination of science and humanity that work together to make this process occur.