JIM BRADLEY is the Program Host for our next meeting on April 13, and he will introduce Sharon Chamberlain, president of Chamberlain Research Consultants. They do voter research for political campaigns, and it will be interesting to see if anyone can make sense out of the current batch of voters. We are in for 7 more months of frantic efforts to influence voting, and maybe we will get some insight on how these barrages of advertising are conceived and directed. Just remember your TV has an "Off" switch.
At the last meeting, the TT was absent but CNN was present. The first was greeted with a mixture of cheers and groans, and the second by surreptitious efforts to present one's "good side" to the camera. No doubt most of us will end up on the cutting room floor, but maybe someone will get 10 seconds of their 15 minutes of fame.
President DICK POMO presided, LINDA BERGREN led the song (with no nonsense about the pitch-STEVE BRIGGS found it on the piano) and ALEX WONG gave a timely and well thought-out invocation. We had some guests in addition to the speaker: PDG JERRY RABACH from the Eye Bank, Sandy Gordon (a curler!) with LINDA BERGREN, and Ellen Mann of Ketchum Public Relations, working with CNN and Lions International. Featured guest was Oleg Novinski, son of MELISSA. He seemed to have a pretty good time.
DAN STOUDT opened his report with a few bars of "Everything's Coming Up Roses" and went on to encourage everyone to make that one last effort. Remember to stress the fact that our fund raising supports our Lion service, and ask your customers to help. The order has gone in, but keep selling - there is a margin for further success in the order. The distribution point this year will be the Zimbrick Buick Community Room, near their Service Department. Dan's directions from the east are questionable, but the map he drew shows where it is. Just go to the front of the Buick dealership and look around. Roses, $24 per dozen, carnations $18 for a bouquet of 18. Free delivery in the Madison area.
The first speaker turned out to be our own MARK LARSON, telling us about what is now the Lions Eye Bank of Wisconsin. He showed how the process works, from donation to the actual surgical transplant, and also ran through the various types of organ and tissue donation and the many ways it can save lives with modern medicine. Organs include the heart, kidneys, liver, lungs, pancreas and intestines, and tissue includes tendons and ligaments, skin, heart valves and corneas. Donated eyes are used primarily for cornea transplants, made necessary by infection, injury and malformation, and those not suitable for transplants are used for medical research and training. There were about 700 cornea transplants last year, and the 970 Lion volunteer transporters delivered over half of them. The network extends over almost the whole state of Wisconsin, and Madison transporters commonly go to Johnson Creek, Portage and Janesville among others. The "relay system" of Lion volunteers is vital to the success of the program. Our club bought a $27,000 specular microscope which the Eye Bank uses every day to determine the usefulness of donated corneal tissue. The ability to precisely evaluate tissues has made more corneas usable. The actual transplant is done on an outpatient basis, takes about 1 ½ hours, and is 90% successful. A second attempt can be made if the first one fails. For vision alone, in the US surgeons are now able to schedule patients for corneal transplant knowing that tissue will be available, but there are 4 million Chinese and 3 million people in India who are blind and whose sight could be restored if corneas and trained surgeons were available. The number of people in the US needing transplants is expected to double in 20 years, and 90% of the persons who need transplants are outside of the US. Helen Keller said "There is no better way to thank God for your sight than to give a helping hand to those in the dark." It makes you proud to be a Lion.
MARK then introduced Mary Nachreiner of Sauk City. Her 16 year old daughter Kelly died as a result of a car accident, but she had indicated she would want to be an organ donor, and that donation saved the lives of three people. She had learned about organ donation in Drivers Ed, and some young people who knew the story successfully urged the Wisconsin legislature to pass a landmark law requiring a 30 minute session on organ donation to be included in all drivers education programs. It was the fastest piece of legislation ever to go through the process and be passed into law, and several other states have followed Wisconsin's lead. Mrs. Nachreiner told us a little bit of how much Kelly's donation (and she stressed that it was Kelly's donation and not the family's) and the subsequent legislation, known as "Kelly's Law" meant to her family, and then went on to stress how important it was. Her life goes on in the lives of the three people she saved. Her family has met one of the recipients, who, in addition to being cured of a fatal disease, is now free of the diabetes he had for most of his life. A moving story for everyone to think about.