PETALING JAYA: The number of new organ donor pledges has plummeted since last year while the waiting list for lifesaving transplants continues to grow.
The introduction of a digital organ donation registration feature in the MySejahtera application in September 2022 led to an initial boost in sign-ups, according to figures from the government’s data.gov.my and KKMNOW websites.
New pledges rose for the full year of 2022 to 51,825 from a mere 7,057 in 2021, but the surge did not last.
Last year (2023) saw registrations falling by 45% to 28,520 from the year before (2022) with an even bigger drop so far this year.
There were only 4,879 pledges from January to April this year, down 61% from the 12,460 in the same period last year (2023).
“The decrease in new pledges since last year is perhaps due to the possibility that many Malaysians are no longer regularly using the MySejahtera app, or have already uninstalled the app,” said National Transplant Resource Center (NTRC) deputy director Dr Hasdy Haron.
He said that registration to be an organ donor can only be done via the MySejahtera app.
The app which was introduced in 2020 was originally developed to help authorities manage the Covid-19 outbreak.
MySejahtera has since been updated to include other health-related features including registrations to become an organ donor.
Selangor recorded the biggest number of organ donor pledges last year at 8,275, followed by Johor (3,609) and Kuala Lumpur (3,167).
On a per capita basis, Kuala Lumpur ranked first last year with 2.32% of its population pledging to donate their organs, followed by Putrajaya (2.11%), Penang (1.66%), Johor (1.35%) and Selangor (1.34%).
Of the 19,502 people who registered as organ donors over a one-year period from April 2023 to April 2024, those aged between 20-29 years made up the biggest group at 7,401 (37.9%), followed by 30-39 at 5,892 (30.2%) and 40-49 (16.9%).
Longer wait
Amid the decline in the number of people pledging to donate their organs, the number of patients on the waiting list is increasing.
According to the NTRC portal, 9,455 people are currently on the waiting list for organ donation and transplant as of April this year, up from 9,097 patients as of May last year.
Kidney patients make up the highest percentage of those needing organ transplants. They make up 9,415 of the 9,455 on the waiting list.
Of that number, 8,979 are adults who require kidneys while the remaining 436 are paediatric patients.
Better efficiency
Despite the slowdown in new organ donor sign-ups, better efficiency in identifying existing donors has led to more transplant operations.
According to figures from the International Registry in Organ Donation and Transplantation (IRODaT), Malaysia recorded an improvement in its organ donation and transplantation rate last year.
For instance, the actual deceased organ donor rate improved to 1.25 donors per million population (pmp) last year from 0.70 donors pmp in 2022.
IRODaT’s data shows that the number of deceased donors last year was 43, up from 23 in 2022.
Improvements were also recorded in living organ donors (4.96 donations pmp), kidney transplants from deceased donors (2.39 transplants pmp) and living donors (4.81 transplants pmp), and liver transplants from deceased donors (0.73 donations pmp).
In terms of transplantation, there were 82 kidney and 25 liver transplants from deceased donors recorded last year according to IRODaT.
Dr Hasdy said that the improved donation rate last year was likely due to better efficiency in terms of detecting deceased donors in time so that their organs can be procured for transplantation.
“We have about 16 hospitals that have a Hospital Organ Procurement Unit which specialises in detecting and identifying individuals who have committed to donating their organs.
“After identifying the deceased who has pledged to become an organ donor, the unit will ask family members for their consent for organ donation,” he added.
“Although we are pleased with the increase in organ donors and transplantation rates last year, we are still striving to improve the figures.”