Southern Miss College of Health Ambassadors Raise Organ Donor Awareness

The University of Southern Mississippi's College of Health Ambassadors have proven organ, eye and tissue donation awareness is an important issue on the Hattiesburg campus and statewide.

For their efforts in fall 2015, when the ambassadors staffed registration tables and handed out awareness materials to fellow students, the Mississippi Organ Recovery Agency (MORA) donated $500 to the Southern Miss College of Health for reaching goals set by the agency.

Since 2012, the College of Health Ambassadors have registered nearly 1,000 new organ, eye and tissue donors in the four consecutive years they have participated in the MORA Donor Challenge. The challenge helps increase awareness for the need of donation and registered donors on college campuses.

“In the four years the College of Health Ambassadors have been involved in the Donor Challenge, the official number of new registries is right at 1,000,” said Chuck Stinson, the director of community services and relations for MORA. “It is safe to say that number is a lot higher because of the impact their outreach efforts have had beyond the designated registration periods.”

Dianne Coleman, adviser for the College of Health Ambassadors and assistant to the dean for special projects, said the ambassadors have learned they can make a difference before they graduate in the lives of Mississippians.

“Ambassador, donor registration drive chair, and nutrition and food system student Madeline Thornton encouraged informative, on-campus discussions and encouraged ambassadors to reach out to their respective communities to provide educational information and registration opportunities,” said Coleman.

At present, approximately 1,500 Mississippians and 122,000+ Americans are in need of a lifesaving transplant. A new patient is added to the national transplant waiting list every 10 minutes and an average of 22 people die each day awaiting a lifesaving transplant that never comes. One organ donor can save eight lives and one tissue donor can save or heal the lives of 50 recipients or more. To register to be an organ, eye and tissue donor go to www.donatelifems.org.

For more about the Southern Miss College of Health, visit www.usm.edu/health. For more information about MORA, visit www.msora.org.