Ryan Dopirak knows the affect organ donation can have on a family. His father is alive thanks to a liver transplant.Dopirak, a second-year medical student at Ohio State, is spreading the word about organ and tissue donation as one of five medical and nursing student interns at Lifeline of Ohio (LOOP).More than 58,000 people in the U.S. are on the waiting list for organ donations, 11 of whom die each day waiting, said Dorrie Dils, senior coordinator for hospital development and professional education at LOOP.Dopirak said it is a challenge for college students to think about organ and tissue donation.”It forces us to think about our own mortality, which is uncomfortable for people of our age group,” he said. “It’s important because even in death, a part of us can live on through organ and tissue donation. It allows for something good to come out of a traumatic situation.”LOOP is a non-profit organization which supports and coordinates the donation of organs and tissues for donation. The student interns are recipients of scholarships from LOOP.”I wanted to take this position with LOOP to increase awareness in the hopes that I would be able to help other families have the opportunity for the same gift of life,” Dopirak said. LOOP intern Kim Irish-Schroeder, a senior nursing student at OSU, was in the room last quarter when the surgeon announced to a patient there was an available liver.”That was the most ultimate experience since everybody was so happy,” she said. “I like seeing that and I like the educational aspects of it.”Reaching out to medical and nursing students is important, Irish-Schroeder said.”We’re there to bring about awareness in our own classmates who are soon going to be out there on the floor talking to patients and families,” she said. “A lot of nurses aren’t comfortable talking about it. If we don’t feel comfortable talking about it, then how is the general public going to talk about it?”The LOOP interns are charged with increasing awareness about organ and tissue donation among their peers at OSU as well as in the Columbus community, Dils said. Research has suggested that both physicians and nurses graduate with little information about organ and tissue donation, she said.”When we adopted this project, our goal was to find an inside route to those students,” Dils said. “Only time will tell what these medical students and nursing students will take into their practice, but we’re certainly hoping that they will think about the options of organ and tissue donation when they talk with their patients.”This year’s big outreach project is Hoops for Life, a 3-on-3 basketball tournament which will be held Saturday at Larkins Hall in the Brown Gymnasium. The event is taking place the day before the start of National Organ and Tissue Donor Awareness Week, which runs from April 19-26. Dopirak said the tournament will serve as an educational tool as well as a fund-raiser for the Donor Family Memorial Wall Fund. The monument, which is still being planned, will be erected on the grounds of LOOP’s headquarters on Kinnear Road.”It’s going to be a permanent memorial to the families who had the courage and compassion to say yes to donation,” Dopirak said.Information about organ and tissue donation as well as organ donor cards will be available at the tournament, Dopirak said. In order to become an organ donor, students can sign an organ donor card and/or tell their loved ones they wish to be a donor, Dils said.”Our slogan is ‘Share your life, share your decision,'” Dils said.