§ Lord Wyatt of Weefordasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they have any proposals to require clinicians, following the establishment of the brain stem death of a patient in their care, to discuss with a kidney transplant unit the suitability of the patient as a donor and the advisability or otherwise of an approach to the relatives.
§ Baroness TrumpingtonWe have no proposals at present to make this a requirement. Following a letter from the department's Chief Medical Officer last year, the Royal College of Physicians has set up a working party to consider how organ donation rates might be improved, including whether a code of practice should be introduced under which clinicians would undertake to approach relatives about organ donation whenever a clinically suitable patient died.