James Shapiro. Photo from ID: Productions.
The Alberta Transplant Institute brings together researchers, clinicians, educators and scholars, patient-partners and policy-makers to improve transplantation and donation in Alberta; achieve global impact in cutting-edge research; and improve patient care, education and advocacy.
The ATI encompasses multiple transplant programs, such as kidney, liver, heart, lung and others, as well as the world's largest islet transplant program. It fosters collaboration across faculties within the University of Alberta, with the University of Calgary, with Alberta Health Services and throughout the province.
The ATI is also home of the Canadian National Transplant Research Program (CNTRP), a network funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and partners, designed to increase organ and tissue donation in Canada and enhance the survival rate and quality of life of Canadians who receive transplants.
How to save a life
By Ross Neitz
The son of a family physician, James Shapiro remembers rummaging as a child through his dad's office, immersed in a world of possibility.
"It was a bit frightening seeing all the instruments and needles and scalpels. But I was completely obsessed with that and I knew I wanted to be a surgeon," recalled Shapiro.
Today, the professor of surgery and liver transplant surgeon's days at the University of Alberta Hospital herald both hope and heartbreak. It is a life filled with purpose, but there is also profound frustration-that for as many lives as he can save, there are far more he can't.
"We have a shortage of organ donors in Canada," said Shapiro, a member of the ATI and Canada Research Chair in Transplant Surgery and Regenerative Medicine. "Although we've done a lot of transplants, every year up until now about a quarter of the patients have died on our waiting lists before transplantation because there just haven't been enough livers to go around."
Shapiro is one of the surgeons featured in two documentaries, Vital Bonds and Memento Mori, which aim to re-energize the Canadian dialogue about organ donations. Both films are co-productions by the National Film Board of Canada and ID: Productions, directed by Edmonton filmmaker and U of A alumnus Niobe Thompson and produced by Rosvita Dransfeld.
The documentaries give unprecedented access to the real-life stories of Canadian organ donors and recipients over a five-month period at the University of Alberta Hospital, one of the busiest transplant hospitals in Canada.
"There are heart-wrenching scenes; one scene with a mom saying goodbye to her son (after it became clear he would not live and a decision had been made to donate his organs). He's being rushed down to the operating room and you see the doors closing and her saying goodbye. You can't help but get choked up by that. That's how desperate and brave that decision was to donate," said Shapiro.
While making the decision to donate organs may be difficult, Shapiro has seen first-hand what a difference just one donor can make: A single donor can benefit more than 75 people and save up to eight lives.
For more information on how to register intent to be an organ and/or tissue donor, see myhealth.alberta.ca.