to gather, process and analyse current research on heart transplants

You are to gather, process and analyse information to outline:
Current research in heart transplants (research carried out in the last two to four years)
The impact of heart transplants on society
to gather information, you need to look in textbooks, magazines and journals and on the internet.
to process the information, you could put the information into a table, with column headings such as researchers, findings, when research was done, success with the method, impact on society.
to analyse the information, you need to identify common areas of research. You could discuss the impact on society with others in order to clarify your ideas on this. Some questions you could ask are:
Who are the best candidates for heart transplants? If the recipient was a young adult, who else would be affected if the recipient s life was saved? What about their economic value to society?
What to do
You need to write a final report for the task above.
You need to also to submit evidence of how you processed the information “ if you used a table when you were gathering the information, or wrote notes, then you need to hand those in with your report. Comment on any inconsistencies or consistencies (common findings) in the different sources.
Write a bibliography to show what resources you used.
Background information
Every day, more than 80 Australians die from coronary heart disease. There are many ways to treat heart disease, the most drastic being a transplant of the heart. The patient s diseased heart is removed and a healthy donor heart is attached. Much research is carried out to improve the process at many different stages. Some areas are as follows:
Anti rejection drugs to prevent the new heart being rejected by the immune system of the body
Matching tissues from the new heart to the patient s tissues
Increase the numbers of available hearts by research into using hearts of baboons, pigs and other animals
Tissue matching and anti rejection drugs for the hearts of other animals
New developments in heart-lung machines used during the operation
List of suggested resources
Sydney man gets first heart transplant at St Vincent”s hospital (16th August 2010) (there is a 6 minute video that is with this article).
http://www.news.com.au/national/sydney-man-gets-first-heart-transplant-at-st-vincents-hospital/story-e6frfkvr-1225905908289
Notes from Senior science HSC Course, Medical technology, LMP, OTEN “ Distance Education, NSW Department of Education and Training, revised 2002, NSW printed materials as follows:
Social implications of heart transplants
The development of medical procedures that allow heart transplants to take place has several impacts in society.
People with heart disease can live a longer life “ this contributes to an aging population.
People awaiting heart transplants can wait years for a transplant due to a lack of donors. This can have a significant impact on the recipient, caregivers and hospitals which attempt to keep the person alive after their own heart ceases to function.
Heart transplant recipients experience emotional distress at being called into hospital to receive a transplant and the donor heart is found to be damaged and not viable for transplantation.
Ethical, moral and religious implications argue for and against replacing body parts to extend the lives of people who would otherwise die.
Patients may increase their susceptibility to other life threatening diseases as a result of a heart transplant by taking immune suppressing drugs which minimise the rejection of transplanted tissue.
Upon obtaining a driver s license, people must choose to be an organ donor or not.
Families of people who die suddenly are faced with organ donation decisions as they are coming to grips with the tragedy.
Families of brain dead victims, whose heart and lungs are functioning, are faced with organ donation decisions when the person still appears to be alive. (Organs are often removed while the body is still functioning to optimise the recipients chances of survival.)
Removal of organs such as a beating heart from a brain dead person has emotional impacts on nurses and medical staff as the person is technically still alive.