September 20th 2023.
Mark Ainscough, a 44-year-old ICU and organ donation nurse, has found that even when one person’s wishes are clearly in favour of donating their organs, family members often find it difficult to make that call. But, in an effort to help children understand organ donation, he wrote a book - Freddie and the Magic Heart - to help children come to terms with the concept.
Mark says: “At that point emotions are so high that you get a lot of families who say ‘even though our loved one wanted to be a donor I just can’t face it’. It’s such a big shock they say they aren’t going to do it and then it ends up becoming a missed opportunity. We respect that, but it’s upsetting because we could’ve saved someone. There’s 7,000 people at any one time waiting for an organ in this country and that’s a lot of people waiting for a phone call that could save their lives.”
Mark was inspired to write the book during a rare moment of peace in the midst of the Covid pandemic. He says: “I just felt strongly that I wanted to write it down and see if it could be useful for someone. I wrote it with a certain scenario in mind, and that’s me being the ICU nurse and having a family who are at the point where their loved one isn’t going to survive. I then say ‘but there is something that can come of this and that’s organ donation - we can help someone else to live’.”
Surprisingly, Mark wrote the book in two hours and it was published two and a half years later. He admits: “I re-read it and thought I really like this so that’s when I decided to put it out there and let someone else see what they thought of it. Until someone reads it a lot of people probably think they’ve written the best thing ever, until someone else says ‘mmm maybe not’.”
Mark had three children at the time - Beth, Carly and Robin - and knew the importance of helping kids understand the process. He had also been struggling with depression in the period before he wrote the book, having lost his mother barely a year after Robin was born, so the response to the book from the nursing community was encouraging. All profits from the book sales go to the Donor Family Network, helping families of organ donation in more ways than one.
Organ Donation Week is a week-long campaign that takes place every year to raise awareness about the ongoing need for organ donors. NHS Blood and Transplant are aiming to get 25,000 new organ donors who can donate one or all of their organs, as well as their tissue. Registering your wish to donate can help family members make a decision, and in the wise words of Freddie: “If her heart can help someone, then I think you should take it.”
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