When Jaycen, Jeremy and Jeffery Kingsbury lost their father in a fatal traffic crash this month, they were asked a question posed for the first time in a new Oregon program.

Although the families of people who die at Oregon hospitals are asked whether they will consent to donating the organs and tissue of the deceased, that question has not been asked of the family members of people who die outside of a hospital until recently.

Last month, the Oregon State Police, in conjunction with the Lions Eye Bank of Oregon and Community Tissue Services in Portland, began a statewide program that will give many families of people killed in car crashes an opportunity to donate some of the deceased's tissue.

The eye bank's focus is recovering eye tissue for corneal and sclera transplants and for research, said Corrina Patzer, the communications director for the eye bank. It prepares tissue for transplant and distributes it to surgeons who are attempting to restore people's eyesight.

Other tissues that can be donated in the program include skin for grafting to treat burn victims, and heart valves, veins, tendons and bones for replacement surgeries.

Organs are not being sought because they are usable only within a four to six-hour window after death. Typically, there is not enough time after a fatal traffic crash to prepare a transplant recipient and complete the surgery within that time.

Between Jan. 1 and Nov. 17, state troopers investigated nearly 160 fatal traffic crashes that killed about 200 people. Statewide, 409 people have died in traffic crashes this year.

The new program is based on a 2-year-old Washington program, which began after Trooper Steve Stockwell realized there was no system in place to help the family of a 20-year-old man killed in a car crash to donate his tissue. Stockwell decided to change that.

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