Decision Making in the Context of Paediatric Solid Organ Transplantation Medicine

Abstract

This manuscript aims to outline ethical, legal, and psychosocial key situations in the context of transplantation under special consideration of children. Besides being particularly vulnerable, children as minors by law are not meant to consent to whatever medical procedure is applied to them. Rather their next-of-kin and medical staff are to decide. In the context of transplantation thus it needs to be reflected under which circumstances a child can become an organ donor or receive an organ. This essay will not provide answers to current questions in transplantation medicine but provide an overview of present European practices and juxtapose divergent courses of action which are based on an assumed similar social-cultural background. Data are drawn from a systematic comparison of the various national organ transplantation laws and tissue acts. Ethical reflections are based on a thematically targeted literature search using PubMed Central and PhilPapers databases.

Keywords: ethics; paediatric; psychology; solid organ transplant; transplant ethics.