Is the following statement true or false? Organs should be preserved only for short periods of time (4 to 8 hours) because longer periods lead to too many complications, and even loss of the organ

FALSE

DISCUSSION: The logistics of organ transplantation make it very difficult to use all available cadaver organs within 4 to 8 hours. To use all the organs requires the capability to preserve them for at least 24 hours. It has been shown that most organs can be matched to a recipient within about 17 to 24 hours. For all but the heart and lung, most intraabdominal organs tolerate preservation for 20 to 30 hours and perform as well as those preserved for 4 to 8 hours. Although undue delay should not be purposefully used, certainly, most organ transplants do not need to be done on an emergency basis. However, this is not true for hearts and lungs, which should be transplanted as quickly as possible.