{"id":248681,"date":"2026-07-20T11:09:32","date_gmt":"2026-07-20T15:09:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=248681"},"modified":"2026-07-20T11:09:32","modified_gmt":"2026-07-20T15:09:32","slug":"uconn-med-student-championing-organ-donation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2026\/07\/uconn-med-student-championing-organ-donation\/","title":{"rendered":"UConn Med Student Championing Organ Donation"},"content":{"rendered":"

UConn School of Medicine medical student Mia Haynes is having a very special, hands-on summer learning experience to help others in need.<\/p>\n

\"Mia
Mia Haynes is in UConn School of Medicine’s Class of 2029.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

She is training in the New England Donor Services<\/a> (NEDS), the federally designated Organ Procurement Organization responsible for the recovery of organs and tissues for transplant in the New England region.<\/p>\n

She is part of a small cohort of medical students selected to participate in the second year of NEDS\u2019 Galen V. Henderson, MD Program<\/a>, an 8-week immersive experience developed for medical students of diverse backgrounds to learn about organ and tissue donation and transplantation.<\/p>\n

Haynes of Salem, New Hampshire, is a graduate of UConn Storrs with a BSE in biomedical engineering with a concentration in biomaterials\/tissue engineering.<\/p>\n

\"Summer
UConn School of Medicine’s Mia Haynes (left) with the rest of the 2026 Henderson Program students on their first day outside NEDS headqaurters in Waltham, MS (Photo courtesy of NEDS).<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Her life was first touched by the importance of organ donation after one of her neighbors needed a heart transplant. Later, Haynes found herself personally in need of a tissue donation after her own ACL injury.<\/p>\n

\"Haynes
Haynes (left) with her NEDS program cohort of trainees.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cThis internship is truly a unique opportunity and has been one of the most rewarding and educational parts of my academic career so far. This internship goes beyond a traditional summer experience and incorporates academic research, community engagement, narrative medicine, and clinical activities,\u201d says Haynes of UConn School of Medicine\u2019s Class of 2029. \u201cEven in eight weeks, I have found myself deeply touched by the mission of NEDS and will incorporate many of these lessons I\u2019ve learned this summer into my future clinical practice.\u201d<\/p>\n

The program is named in honor of Dr. Galen V. Henderson, who was an associate medical director of New England Donor Services and first Black neurointensivist in the United States. He became director of Neurocritical Care at Brigham and Women\u2019s Hospital in 2001 and was the recipient of three awards from the Department of Health and Human Services for his contributions to the field of organ donation. He served in several national leadership roles in organ donation and was instrumental in standardizing neurocritical pathways in the context of organ donation. Dr. Henderson passed away on December 28, 2023, at the age of 57.<\/p>\n

The program is providing Haynes and her cohort of fellow medical students a hybrid learning model combining on-site seminars with experiential activities in clinical and community settings. Clinicians, scientists, and other notable experts expose students to different career paths and teach about the donation and transplant system, infectious disease and immunology, neurocritical care, ethics, organ allocation, disparities, and emerging technologies, among other topics. A hallmark feature of the program is the opportunity for students to talk to organ donor families, living donors, and transplant patients. Students also observe organ and tissue recovery, shadow transplant physicians and surgeons at regional transplant centers, and complete a scholarly project as part of the program. Students are provided with a stipend from New England Donor Services (NEDS) to cover living expenses during the program and are mentored by experienced researchers at NEDS with academic appointments at Harvard Medical School and research collaborations nationally.<\/p>\n

\"Mia
Mia Haynes in action in the NEDS training program during the summer of 2026 (Photo by NEDS).<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cThis program has taught me about the complexities and multifaceted world of tissue and organ donation. This type of work is truly saving lives and changing lives for the better. It truly speaks to why I originally wanted to pursue a career and medicine,\u201d says Haynes.<\/p>\n

After the summer immersion experience, Haynes looks forward to continuously engaging with NEDS in their community activities and beyond.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt UConn Health, I am part of the Urban Service Track\/AHEC Scholars Program which aims to provide a community focused medical education that works with underserved populations. These two organizations share many of the same qualities and missions and I look forward to my continuous engagement even after the culmination of this program. I aspire to use the experience I\u2019ve gained from the compassion from family service coordinators, the grit and clinical excellence from the transplant surgeons, the tireless dedication from all NEDS staff members, the bravery from the patients and their families, and the new friendships I\u2019ve gained with my fellow cohort students in a future career in surgery.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mia Haynes in UConn\u2019s Class of 2029 is Training with the New England Donor Services (NEDS) Summer Immersion Program.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":98,"featured_media":248691,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2388,1868,2712,2233],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[1873],"class_list":["post-248681","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-healthcare-workforce","category-meds","category-student-success","category-university-news"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-07-28 08:32:51","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248681","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/98"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=248681"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248681\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":248692,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248681\/revisions\/248692"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/248691"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=248681"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=248681"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=248681"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=248681"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=248681"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}