Nancy Paro of Derry remembers her 16-year-old daughter Amanda talking at their dining room table about registering to become an organ and tissue donor when she got her driver's license.
She did.
It was a decision that six years later, when Amanda died, would transform many lives, including those of her mother and two sisters. They have become steadfast advocates for organ and tissue donor registration.
Their efforts dovetail with a statewide effort to urge license holders to consider registering to be organ and tissue donors through the New Hampshire Donor Registry.
Today, there are 116,494 people on the registry in New Hampshire as a result of signing up at the Division of Motor Vehicles.
Nationally, just under 50 percent of people with driver's licenses have designated themselves as donors, said Dave Teune of the New England Organ Bank
The goal is boost that number to 75 percent, both nationally and in New Hampshire, he said. The Organ Bank is recruiting people to register as organ and tissue donors.
DMV offices now have posters, pens, brochures and computer monitors with the Donate Life message. The Organ Bank wants people to know that registering will not interfere with any lifesaving medical care.
That people of any driving age and with any medical condition can register.
That there is never a cost to the donor's family for organ or tissue donation.
That all major religions support donation as a generous lifesaving act.
And that each donor can save the lives of seven people through organ donation and improve the lives of more than 50 people through tissue donation.
Amanda Paro's donations helped more than 30 people.
The Colby-Sawyer College nursing student was on the verge of graduating in 2003 when she was killed in an automobile accident on a snow-covered Interstate 89 while doing her clinical work at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Hospital.
Amanda's organs could not be transplanted after the accident but her body tissue could.
Her left cornea went to a 20-year-old man. Her right cornea was given to a 68-year-old woman.
A heart valve went to a 9-year-old.
Arteries, veins and skin went to hospital patients. Twenty-three people received bone transplants.
Not all are so fortunate.
Each year, more than 250 New Englanders die waiting for an organ transplant. Nationally, the number is about 6,000 people.
Every day, 18 people die waiting for an organ transplant. There are 106,000 nationally waiting for transplants.
These are figures that Nancy Paro and her daughters know through their advocacy work, and numbers they want to change for the better.
Nancy Paro, a retired second-grade teacher from Grinnell Elementary School in Derry, speaks to students, civic groups and others about the lifesaving impact of organ and tissue donations.
Amanda's twin sister, Amy McDonald, 29, a special education teacher, volunteers for organ donation registration drives.
Her activities include mailing literature and public speaking.
McDonald said her mother and older sister, Kari Mull, 32, devote much more of their lives to the cause.
Mull quit her job as a chemist at Yale University to become a program manager for Donate Life Connecticut.
"It was the only positive that came from my sister's death," Mull said. "She believed in this. It was my way of keeping her memory alive."
Nancy Paro said Amanda's death changed their lives.
They live more in the moment, feel more comfortable thinking about death, and have gained solace knowing Amanda helped others live.
"The worst day in our life was the best day for 37-some-odd people because Mandy decided to become a donor," she said.
To learn more about organ and tissue donation, visit www.DonateLifeNewEngland.org.
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