HE had lived a good long life, but the man was deteriorating rapidly in hospital, with his loved ones around him.

It was now up to Jo Redfarn to ask the family the difficult question – had they thought about organ donation?

He was a pensioner, but his organs were healthy enough to give someone the gift of life.

“The family said he had lived such a happy, fulfilling life that it would be fantastic that he would be able to help others,” remembered Jo, one of six East Anglia donor co-ordinators.

They are not alone in their reaction. For many families facing a similar ordeal, making a decison about their critically-ill loved one becoming an organ donor is sometimes the only decision they get to make.

“It is the only positive thing to come out of the situation and it does help people,” explained Jo.

What would make this even easier for next of kin is if loved ones had not only joined the NHS Organ Donor Register but told them of their wishes.

It means that when organ donation is mentioned at such a devastating time, families know what their loved ones would have wanted.

That aside, Jo understands it is not the usual conversation families have at the dinner table.

“But saying what you want makes it easier for those left behind,” she stressed.

Despite next of kin having the final say about organ donation, it is very rare for them to go against the wishes of someone who has added their name to the donor register.

A recent survey found that although 90 per cent of people agree with organ donation, only 60 per cent of families give consent.

Supporting the Gazette’s Be A Star This Christmas campaign, Jo, who is based at Addenbrooke’s Hospital, Cambridge, said: “There is a huge national shortage of organs and it is going to get worse unless people sign up and talk about their wish that, in the event of their death, they want to be a donor.”

Jo first becomes involved with a possible donor when she is contacted by a hospital intensive care unit or accident and emergency department to say they have a patient who is dying.

If the patient is assessed as being suitable, the next of kin are approached to see if they would like their loved one to become a donor.

For Jo, it is a time to give them all the information they need so they can make an informed choice. If the patient has signed the organ donor register, it is a lever to help the family make the decision.

“My job,” stressed Jo, “is not to coerce the family, but to help them make an informed decision.”

If the patient is to be a donor then Jo or one of the other donor co-ordinators becomes involved in the whole process, from supporting the family and going into theatre with the deceased patient, to making sure the organs are to be transported to the right hospital, where a recipent will be waiting.

It is a process that is carried out with dignity and respect at every stage.

For Jo, the donor family has shown huge strength in giving the gift of life to a stranger at such a tragic time in their lives.

They had to make a difficult decision when their world had been turned upside down.

Being on the organ donor register is one way of making that process easier for the ones you hold dear.