A SERVICE
OF 
Under New Federal
Contract, UNOS Will Still Run OPTN
RICHMOND, Va.: October 15, 2000 · by TNN Medical Reporter
Virginia Baskerville
- The United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) will continue to run the
nation's Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network, under a new federal
contract awarded by the Department of Health and Human Services.
The
three-year contract is worth about $52 million, according to UNOS. It includes
options for two one-year extensions, which could bring its value to more than
$100 million. The award, issued in late September, marks the fifth consecutive
time UNOS has won the contract since it was first awarded in 1986.
Under
the contract, UNOS administers the national system for organ matching and
distribution. The new OPTN contract "has been substantially expanded," UNOS
said, so that "UNOS will have total responsibility for all transplant data
collection."
The Associated Press and Reuters news service reported that
the new contract also requires UNOS to distribute organs to the sickest
patients on a nationwide basis rather than the traditional way-within smaller
geographic regions. Although UNOS has fought attempts by HHS to broaden
allocation areas over the last several years, UNOS is now contracted to do so,
the news services said.
For the first time since 1987, however, UNOS was
not chosen to run the Scientific Registry of Transplants Recipients. That job
went to University Renal Research and Education Association (URREA), a
not-for-profit foundation based in Ann Arbor, Michigan. The three-year contract
is for $7.8 million, also with the potential to extend for two more years,
bringing the contract's potential total worth to $13.4 million.
Although
UNOS will continue to collect transplant data, URREA's job will be to analyze
it.
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