Liver Transplant Essay Example for Free

Liver Transplant Essay Organ transplants are some of the hardest surgeries that doctors can do. They require many trained personnel, time, and complicated procedures. Liver transplants are among the most difficult organ transplants that can be done. There are also many risks involved with the surgery and patients must face all of them in order to come out with a new and working liver. According to the American Liver Foundation patients that undergo a liver transplant have a 75% chance of survival after five years. In other words, one in four patients will die in five years due to their new liver. Even for organ transplants, that is a very low chance of survival. Organ transplants tend to be very complex in nature. Since livers have so many functions they are among the hardest to transplant safely. The surgeon must first make a cut in the upper abdomen. Then they must remove the old liver by cutting it off from the blood vessels and bile ducts. The surgeon must then place the new liver into the patient’s body and connect it to the old blood vessels and bile ducts. Most operations usually take around 12 hours and since there is so much blood lost new blood must be continually added through a transfusion for the whole of the operation. There are many problems with this surgery and the first one is the act of moving the donated liver to the patient that will receive it. The liver can only stay functioning for a short period of time outside of the body. That means that as soon as a liver is taken from a donor it must be immediately transported to the recipient. This requires that many people work together as one to set up an appointment for the patient and the donor, to remove the liver from the donor, ship the donor’s liver to the recipient, put the liver into the recipient, close them up, and manage the finances of the whole operation. All of this requiring much time, effort, and money. There is yet an even larger risk that the new liver might be seen as an invader of the body by the immune system. This would mean that the body would start to break apart the new liver and attack it with cells that were made to fight off disease. The immune system would essentially be fighting off the thing trying to help it. Unfortunately all transplant patients also become dependent on immunosuppressive drugs that keeps the immune system from attacking the liver. While these drug may be helpful they also keep patients from fighting off infections, so all patients have a harder time fighting off disease. The patients must also use these drugs for as long as they live, adding up to thousands of dollars over the patient’s life. Luckily there are many new procedures that will make the chance of survival even higher. For instance, doctors can now take a small piece of a living donor’s liver and graft it onto the recipient’s liver. This can be done since the body only needs a small part of the a liver to carry out its normal functions, things like transporting the bile from the gallbladder to the intestines and detoxifying the blood. The procedure usually has to be done with donors and patients that have the same blood type and other major body factors. This means that a surgery is usually done with members of the same family. Another great thing for liver transplant patients is a new liquid that organs can be placed in for transportation. It keeps the organ as fresh as if it were inside the body. This allows the organ to be moved much farther than it would have otherwise. Instead of it being moved just 30 minutes away it can be moved across the country. But even this is not perfect, even in this liquid organs can still break down and fail to work inside of the new body. In the end, the benefits of liver transplantations far outweigh the risks for only one reason. Every patient will die if they do not receive a new liver.

The Theme of Community in the Open Boat Essay -- American Literature S

Stephen Crane's Theme of Community Stephen Crane is well known in the literary world for his many underlying themes. In Stephan Crane's "The Open Boat," one of the many themes that can be seen is that of community. He brings to life the importance of the each individual's role in the group setting. Crane uses a dire situation in which men's lives are in the hands of each other to show that without group togetherness no one would make it. He shows the group being given false hopes from outside forces but, how in the end the group must band together for survival and not rely on anything but themselves. "The Open Boat" is one of Crane's best known works. Throughout the story, paralleling an actually event in his life Crane brings the reader inside the minds of his characters. By letting the reader see what each individual character is feeling, the sense of needing a community can be felt. Stephan Crane's life was not long, but with his time he accomplished much. Crane's use of the community theme can easily be linked to his own personal experiences. He was born in Newark New Jersey in 1871 as the 14th child of a Methodist minister. His father died while Crane was still a young child. He attended two years of college. After his short college career Crane lived in a medical boarding house in New York City. There he started his freelance writing. In 1893 he published his first book, Maggie: Girl of the Streets. Throughout these earlier years in his life he also wrote Red Badge of Courage and The Black Rider, along with many other works. In 1879 Crane attempted to do journalistic reporting on the insurrection of Cuba. On his voyage the ship the Commodore sunk, leaving him to float to safety in a lifeboat. It is from this experienc... ...4th, 2003] Available on the World Wide Web: http://www.nagasaki-gaigo.ac.jp/ishikawa/amlit/c/crane_s19re.htm Works Cited Source: ENCYCLOPEDIA BRITANNICA, American Literature on the Web Stephen Crane (1871-1900), [cited April 24th, 2003] Available on the World Wide Web: http://www.nagasaki-gaigo.ac.jp/ishikawa/amlit/c/crane_s19re.htm Crane, Stephen "The Open Boat" in Literature: Reading Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and the Essay 4th Ed. Robert Di Yanni (New York, New York, 1998) Stephan Crane's "The Open Boat", [cited April 24th, 2003] Available on the World Wide Web: http://sites.unc.edu/storyforms/openboat/community/index.html

Death of a Salesman Context Essay

Death of a Salesman is a play that consists of a HISTORICAL background which is key to understanding the play. It was written in 1949, just a few years after the World War ll was over, meaning the United States, where the play occurs, was going through many changes. For example, the war caused an increase in industrial production markets and non-farming business. For the poorest Americans, however, the economic situation was not improved as America started having high inflation, causing problems for the poorest citizens to purchase the basics. Also, the government started to create policies which helped larger corporate farmers but not smaller farmers. Happy, a sales clerk and Biff, a farm worker, had the lowest-paid jobs in the country, leading them to some trouble in maintaining dignity in society. For Americans, dignity and pride were very important things. Due to their victories during the war, Americans felt proud and had a feeling of superiority over the world. This lead to the ir need of proving that capitalism was better than communism. Because of this, Americans felt responsible for protecting their nation from any influences from communist Soviet Union. This period of time where Americans felt the obligation to achieve financial success in order to show gratitude for the liberty they had as a democratic society and also to defeat the Soviets is now called the Cold War era. During this period of time, people like Willy relied too much on long-term credit to show they were financially successful and ended up having trouble in giving their families the basics. In the play, this Cold War attitude is shown by Willy’s preoccupation with his position in society and financial status. Willy’s worry also represents some of the SOCIAL context in the play as he fears not being accepted in society; he wants to be â€Å"well liked†. American society changed after WWll. Before, people were motivated by morals and rules but after the Cold War era started, Americans became motivated bywhat others thought of th em. Willy represents the people in American society who lost their identity due to their need to achieve social standards. This idea is reflected at the end of the play where Biff says that Willy â€Å"didn’t know who he was.† This social change may have been a cause of POLITICAL change because, as a result of The Great Depression, American government became more influential on citizens’ daily lives.  Because of this, and also due to an increase in media communication such as radio and television, Americans started to feel like they belonged to a large, connected society and along came a desire to be accepted by their peers in society. Miller also shows some of the CULTURAL background behind the play through three of his main characters: Willy, Ben and Biff as the three of them, similar to many Americans at the time, show they are eager to achieve â€Å"The American Dream†. Two versions of the American Dream are mentioned in the play. One is represented by Willy, focused mostly on money which was a way Americans found to show they had the â€Å"freedom and liberty† to purchase material goods. The other version is shown through Biff and Ben with their â€Å"go West, young man† mythology representing the dream of having the liberty for new adventures. Leticia Hosang

Great Depression Basics and Roosevelts New Deal

The Great Depression was a period of worldwide economic depression that lasted from 1929 until approximately 1939. The starting point of the Great Depression is usually listed as October 29, 1929, commonly called Black Tuesday. This was the date when the stock market fell dramatically 12.8%. This was after two previous stock market crashes on Black Tuesday (October 24), and Black Monday (October 28). The Dow Jones Industrial Average would eventually bottom out by July, 1932 with a loss of approximately 89% of its value. However, the actual causes of the Great Depression are much more complicated than just the stock market crash. In fact, historians and economists do not always agree about the exact causes of the depression. Throughout 1930, consumer spending continued to decline which meant businesses cut jobs thereby increasing unemployment. Further, a severe drought across America meant that agricultural jobs were reduced. Countries across the globe were affected and many protectionist polices were created thereby increasing the problems on a global scale. Franklin Roosevelt and His New Deal Herbert Hoover was president at the beginning of the Great Depression. He tried to institute reforms to help stimulate the economy but they had little to no effect. Hoover did not believe that the federal government should be directly involved in economic affairs and would not fix prices or change the value of the currency. Instead, he focused on helping states and private businesses to provide relief.   By 1933, unemployment in the United States was at a staggering 25%. Franklin Roosevelt easily defeated Hoover who was seen as out of touch and uncaring. Roosevelt became president on March 4, 1933 and immediately instituted the first New Deal.  This was a comprehensive group of short-term recovery programs, many of which were modeled on those that Hoover had attempted to create. Roosevelts New Deal not only included economic aid, work assistance programs, and greater control over businesses but also the end of the gold standard and of prohibition. This was then followed by the Second New Deal programs which included more long-term assistance such as the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), the Social Security System, the Federal Housing Administration (FHA), Fannie Mae, the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), and the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC). However, there is still question today about the effectiveness of many of these programs as a recession occurred in 1937 -38. During these years, unemployment rose again. Some blame the New Deal programs as being hostile towards businesses. Others state that the New Deal, while not ending the Great Depression, at least helped the economy by increasing regulation and preventing further decay. No one can argue that the New Deal fundamentally changed the way that the federal government interacted with the economy and the role it would take in the future. In 1940, unemployment was still at 14%. However, with Americas entry into World War II and subsequent mobilization, unemployment rates dropped to 2% by 1943. While some argue that the war itself did not end the Great Depression, others point to the increase in government spending and increased job opportunities as reasons why it was a large part of the national economic recovery. Learn more about the Great Depression Era: Causes of the Great DepressionNew Deal ProgramsNew Deal AcronymsHerbert Hoover BiographyFranklin Roosevelt Biography