One death could help dozens of lives now that a bone and tissue recovery team is operating in Thunder Bay.
The Lake Superior Centre for Regenerative Medicine team recovered bone, heart valves and other tissue for the first time at Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre May 16.
RegenMed CEO Bob Thayer said whereas before the hospital could recover from one or two donors a year, his team will be able to recover up to 30. Each donor can help up to 75 people he added. And once the tissue bank is operating at full capacity, it will be able to travel to other towns across the region as well.
"Currently donors are not being recovered in those hospital facilities because there are no recovery teams," Thayer said.
The two-member for the not-for-profit RegenMed were trained in the United Stated recently, with up to four more expected to be trained soon Thayer said. The teams will operate in surgical units at the region's hospital.
The province currently spends $18 million a year on bone and tissue from the United States. Tissue recovered in Thunder Bay will be used throughout the province.
"We have an obligation to provide tissue to all of Ontario," said Thayer.
