how not to be an organ donor

HOW NOT TO BE AN ORGAN DONOR

this is a blurry picture of the donor dot on my drivers license
it means take my organs if they are needed

one way may be to not to donate your organs before you are ready is to not go to a motorcycle rally

when i first moved to california in the early 1970s i bought a used motorcycle from my historian brothers friend who i think was being sent overseas during the vietnam war 

it was my mode of transportation while i was in my first year there in college
yes i wore a helmet

i also worked in the local emergency room in the upper desert as an emergency room technician
thats how i worked the 6 years it took me to get my bachelors degree

on weekends the high desert became a place to go to ride your dune buggies motorcycles hang gliders one person planes and other potential lethal machines
there were miles and miles of trails to ride
there were large dry lake beds to ride on

i use to take my bike out to the dry beds
you could drive miles in any direction
i did it only on weekdays
never ever on weekends

for on weekends
our emergency room 
became a war zone

our emergency room became more of  a triage center
our hospital couldnt handle the volume and the worst of the trauma cases
so
on weekends
there was a steady stream of ambulances back and forth to cities like san bernardino fontana riverside loma linda los angeles you name a city we shipped them back there

i also worked in the ambulances sometimes and made a lot of trips back and forth

there were lots of dirt bike races and i would sometimes work the ambulances for the events

in the desert there were no rules or traffic laws
we saw plane crashes motorcyles running into the side of campers people getting decapitated from lines from single person aircraft tons of head injures lots of broken bones and other injuries
and
after reading this article linked here had it been a few years later
there would have been plenty of organ donors
sadly

after about a year of riding my motorcycle and seeing all this trauma
i gave my motorcycle away and drove a car
i have never rode a motorcycle since
i plan on never doing so either

in the last couple of years before i retired i lost two middle age men patients with young families from motorcycle wrecks
one was an austin policeman providing escort for a funeral who was hit when someone ran into him and killed him
another was pulling out of his driveway when he was hit and killed

this article with a link in it from the original research paper describes how the number of transplants go up by 26% in the regions around these large bike rallies
eg the sturgis rally in south dakota
the republic of texas rally in austin

my clinic was close to the toll road leading into austin and on thursday and friday before the rally you could hear this steady drone noise like a beehive all day long as the riders headed into asutin from the north

im sure some of them became potential organ donors that weekend

so 
if you are going to be a motorcycle rider make sure you have signed you organ donor approval on you drivers license and get the dot like i have on my drivers license
you might  lose you life 
but
you might save one or more peoples lives with a heart or a kidney or other organs 

so please check you license and make sure its says organ donor on it

the organicgreen doctor