Heart transplant allocation debate
Do now
Students will debate how donor hearts should be allocated among competing patients.
- Hand in
- Written ranking of transplant allocation criteria with a one-sentence justification for the top criterion and acknowledgment of one tradeoff.
- Where
- Turn this in at the drop folder with your district Microsoft sign-in, or hand it to Mr. Mendoza in class. Both count as submitted. Doing the activity in myPLTW does not.
You get two school days for every day you were absent, so this deadline moves with you.
Four patients need the one heart that just became available tonight. Who should get it, and what rule are you willing to defend out loud?
Students will debate how donor hearts should be allocated among competing patients.
- • Each student defends an allocation criterion.
- • Groups acknowledge one tradeoff in their ranking.
- If a hospital has one donor heart and three patients who need it, name one thing you would want to know about each patient before choosing.
- Is it more fair to give the heart to whoever has waited longest, or to whoever is sickest right now? Pick one and give a reason.
- 1Read short profiles of patients awaiting a transplant.
- 2Form groups representing the transplant committee.
- 3List two criteria you would use to allocate the heart.
- 4Defend your ranking against one opposing group.
- 5Write your final ranking with one justification.
What did this day actually feel like?
Heart transplant allocation debate
ETHICS MONDAY Rank the allocation criteria and defend the ranking in one sentence. Medical urgency, likelihood of success, time on the list, age.
Every ranking I tried produced a case I could not accept. Ranking urgency first means a heart can go to someone unlikely to survive the surgery. Ranking success first quietly disadvantages the sickest. There is no ordering that is not a value judgment.
AT HOME, THE NIGHT BEFORE WED APR 21 Heart structure and cycle Tracing the blood path from the right atrium all the way through and back. Four chambers, two circuits, valves that only open one way.
I had to trace it five times before it was automatic. The thing that finally made it stick is that the right side is a short trip to the lungs and the left side has to reach your foot, which is why the left ventricle wall is so much thicker.
Turned in: annotated heart diagram → Lab Notebooks folder
Fiction. There is no such student. The lessons, labs and dates are the real planned course; the student, the classmates and the conversations are invented.
The same day, drawn.
Rank the allocation criteria and defend the ranking in one sentence. Medical urgency, likelihood of success, time on the list, age.
Fiction. There is no such student. The lessons, labs and dates are the real planned course; the student, the classmates and the conversations are invented.
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🔑 Today's words · 5
Tap a word in the lesson for a plain meaning and one example. Recycled into next week's Do-Now.
Do the work · 80-minute blockfirst 5 min = hook▸
💡 Big idea: Donor organs are scarce, so allocation systems must rank patients by competing criteria, which means every choice trades urgency, equity, and likelihood of success against one another.
- 0-8Read patient profiles; assign committee groups
- 8-22Group prep: list 2 allocation criteria from your committee's perspective
- 22-40Debate round 1: each group presents its top criterion with justification
- 40-55Challenge round: each group defends ranking against one opposing criterion
- 55-70Individual writing: final ranking with one-sentence justification per criterion
- 70-80Share rankings; submit exit ticket
- • Right now, thousands of patients in the United States are waiting for a donor heart.
- • Today you will sit on the committee that decides who gets the next one.
- • There is no perfect answer, but your reasoning must be defensible and consistent.
- • Leave with a written ranking and a justification for your top criterion.
- • Transplant allocation criteria typically include medical urgency, compatibility, wait time, and likelihood of success.
- • Scarcity of donor organs means every allocation decision involves tradeoffs that affect patient outcomes.
- • Bioethics in cardiology is a component of the /Physiology/Pathophysiology WebXam domain.
Unit 3.1 Cardiopulmonary Connection: Cardiovascular and respiratory systems, blood vessels, heart structure, EKG interpretation. · Heart transplant allocation debate
Day 1 of this lesson. Open this exact section in myPLTW (find it in Clever, Microsoft sign-in), then do the work below.
Do this: Open Lesson 3.1 Cardiopulmonary Connection in myPLTW and complete the ethics or debate reflection prompt for today's heart-transplant allocation activity.
Mark the activity complete in myPLTW after submitting your allocation exit ticket.
You finished Lesson 2.3 investigation content; this begins Lesson 3.1, and the task should be checked off today.
Note or screenshot of completion status for your tracker.
The official PLTW activity stays inside myPLTW. If myPLTW will not open, use F1 and E1-E3 on this page to complete today's local evidence decision, then make up the official activity when access returns. Turn this in at the drop folder with your district Microsoft sign-in, or hand it to Mr. Mendoza in class. Both count as submitted. Doing the activity in myPLTW does not.
Check things off as you work, then submit. This tells Mr. Mendoza how you're doing so he can help the class. It does not replace turning in your producible through the submission route shown below.
Use the code Mr. Mendoza gave you, not your name. Saved on this device.
Unit 3.1 Cardiopulmonary Connection: Cardiovascular and respiratory systems, blood vessels, heart structure, EKG interpretation. · Heart transplant allocation debate
Open Lesson 3.1 Cardiopulmonary Connection in myPLTW and complete the ethics or debate reflection prompt for today's heart-transplant allocation activity.
You finished Lesson 2.3 investigation content; this begins Lesson 3.1, and the task should be checked off today.
This is how Mr. Mendoza sees the class keeping pace with PLTW. Be honest, it only helps if it is accurate.
🎯 Students will debate how donor hearts should be allocated among competing patients.
- Read short profiles of patients awaiting a transplant.
- Form groups representing the transplant committee.
- List two criteria you would use to allocate the heart.
- Defend your ranking against one opposing group.
- Write your final ranking with one justification.
Exit ticket: Written ranking of transplant allocation criteria with a one-sentence justification for the top criterion and acknowledgment of one tradeoff.
Turn this in at the drop folder with your district Microsoft sign-in, or hand it to Mr. Mendoza in class. Both count as submitted. Doing the activity in myPLTW does not. Use the checklist just below and upload by 11:29 PM for full credit. Absent with an excused absence? You get two school days for every day you were absent, so this deadline moves with you.
| Task | Who |
|---|---|
| Read short profiles of patients awaiting a transplant. | _______ |
| Form groups representing the transplant committee. | _______ |
| List two criteria you would use to allocate the heart. | _______ |
| Defend your ranking against one opposing group. | _______ |
| Write your final ranking with one justification. | _______ |
Working solo? Put your own name in "Who" for every row.
- Each student defends an allocation criterion.
- Groups acknowledge one tradeoff in their ranking.
- 1Do thisStudents will debate how donor hearts should be allocated among competing patients.
- 2Use this resource
- 3Submit thisExit ticket: Written ranking of transplant allocation criteria with a one-sentence justification for the top criterion and acknowledgment of one tradeoff.
- 4Submit it here
- 1Open the drop folder.
- 2Sign in with your district Microsoft account, not a personal one.
- 3Upload the file, named Lastname_Firstname__Assignment Title.
- 4Your own upload panel says Uploaded with a green check: that is your receipt.
Turn this in at the drop folder with your district Microsoft sign-in, or hand it to Mr. Mendoza in class. Both count as submitted. Doing the activity in myPLTW does not. Human Anatomy & Physiology (Human Body Systems) › Unit 3.1 Cardiopulmonary Connection: Cardiovascular and respiratory systems, blood vessels, heart structure, EKG interpretation. › Exit ticketOpen the drop folder
Learn it · deck, reading, and vocabulary▸
The deck carries the prior idea forward, lets you inspect an analogy, maps the rule to biology, and ends with the same evidence decision and exit ticket used on this page.
Generated from this lesson's canonical data with a red-team citation check.
Graphing reveals the dose-response pattern and a CER converts it into argument, so that stating limitations bounds the claim honestly and makes the conclusion more credible, not less.
Donor organs are scarce, so allocation systems must rank patients by competing criteria, which means every choice trades urgency, equity, and likelihood of success against one another.
A bridge prototype is tested against a load limit, cost limit, and user need before revision.
- Which requirement is a criterion?
- Which limit is a constraint?
- What test result should trigger a redesign?
A design improves when evidence is compared with explicit criteria and constraints.
Biomedical designs also require , ethics, and biological validation beyond a physical prototype test.
- • Bridge requirements map to design criteria.
- • Load results map to E1-E3.
- • Revision maps to the next evidence-based iteration.
Driving question: Four patients need the one heart that just became available tonight. Who should get it, and what rule are you willing to defend out loud?
What you already know: Graphing reveals the dose-response pattern and a CER converts it into argument, so that stating limitations bounds the claim honestly and makes the conclusion more credible, not less.
New idea: Donor organs are scarce, so allocation systems must rank patients by competing criteria, which means every choice trades urgency, equity, and likelihood of success against one another.
Visual or model: F1. F1. A lesson illustration or teaching diagram for Heart transplant allocation debate. Use it with E1-E3; it is a model or context image, not experimental or patient data. What to notice: Trace the labeled structure, movement, or system relationship that connects form to function.
- Observe or measure the relevant feature in Heart transplant allocation debate.
- Organize the observation with a stable evidence ID.
- Apply this rule: A design improves when evidence is compared with explicit criteria and constraints.
- Choose the option the evidence supports and state the limit of the conclusion.
Real biomedical example: Four patients need the one heart that just became available tonight. Who should get it, and what rule are you willing to defend out loud?
What the evidence supports: E1-E3 and F1 support the daily take-home when the response meets the stated success criteria.
What it cannot prove: The package does not support claims beyond this lesson's or any real patient diagnosis.
- • : A thick, muscular blood vessel that carries blood away from the heart to the body, handling the high pressure of each heartbeat.
- • vein: A blood vessel that carries blood back toward the heart, usually at lower pressure and equipped with valves that keep blood from flowing backward.
- • : The smallest blood vessel, with walls one cell thick, where oxygen, nutrients, and wastes are exchanged between blood and body tissues.
- • : One of the two upper chambers of the heart that receives incoming blood and pushes it down into the below.
- • : A lower pumping chamber of the heart that pushes blood out to the lungs or to the rest of the body with each beat.
- • EKG: A recording of the heart's electrical activity over time, used to check rhythm and detect problems with how the heart beats.
- • : One complete heartbeat in which the chambers relax and fill with blood, then contract to pump it out to the lungs and body.
- • : The rhythmic expansion of an you can feel as the heart pumps blood, used to measure how many times the heart beats per minute.
Use it now: Choose one decision option. Cite E1 and E3, then explain how the rule connects the evidence to your choice.
Go further, optional: The source links below are optional enrichment. Every fact required for today's local evidence decision appears in this lesson package.
Transplant allocation criteria typically include medical urgency, compatibility, wait time, and likelihood of success.
Limit: E1 supplies context or an observation; it does not by itself establish the explanation.
Donor organs are scarce, so allocation systems must rank patients by competing criteria, which means every choice trades urgency, equity, and likelihood of success against one another.
Limit: E2 is a teaching statement or comparison and must be checked against the task evidence.
Each student defends an allocation criterion.
Limit: E3 supports only the result or product criterion named here; it cannot justify a broader clinical or causal claim.
PLTW-HAP-2027-04-19 · Simulated classroom evidence scenario
Your role: anatomy and physiology consultant
Decision: Your team must decide what the evidence from Heart transplant allocation debate supports before submitting the exit response named on the lesson page.
- • Select the option best supported by E1-E3.
- • Select a reasonable alternative and name the evidence it would require.
- • Delay the claim because the evidence does not distinguish the options.
Response: State one choice, cite at least two evidence IDs, explain the rule that connects them, and add one limitation. Submit it as the exit response.
Claim ceiling: The supplied lesson evidence can support an observation, pattern, classroom mechanism, or next-step decision about Heart transplant allocation debate. It cannot by itself prove causation, establish a real clinical diagnosis, or justify action outside this classroom task.
Reason for review: Your team must decide what the evidence from Heart transplant allocation debate supports before submitting the exit response named on the lesson page.
Context: Medicine runs on scarce resources, so every clinical system has to build fair rules for who gets treatment first, and those rules always trade one good value against another.
- • T1: Read short profiles of patients awaiting a transplant.
- • T2: Form groups representing the transplant committee.
- • T3: List two criteria you would use to allocate the heart.
- • T4: Defend your ranking against one opposing group.
- • T5: Write your final ranking with one justification.
- • E1: Transplant allocation criteria typically include medical urgency, compatibility, wait time, and likelihood of success.
- • E2: Donor organs are scarce, so allocation systems must rank patients by competing criteria, which means every choice trades urgency, equity, and likelihood of success against one another.
- • E3: Each student defends an allocation criterion.
Measurements: Use only the measurements, units, graph, or counts supplied in today's task. No additional patient measurement is implied.
Figure finding: Teaching diagram for Heart transplant allocation debate. Trace the labeled structure, movement, or system relationship that connects form to function. This is a teaching model, not patient or experimental data.
Uncertainty: This is a composite classroom scenario. Missing history, measurements, or confirmation tests remain unknown and limit the conclusion.
Mean = sum of values / number of values. Median = middle ordered value. Range = maximum - minimum.
For 2, 4, 4, and 10: mean = 20 / 4 = 5, median = 4, and range = 10 - 2 = 8.
Mean, median, and range keep the measurement unit. Order the values before finding the median.
Calculate the requested summary for today's supplied values, then write what it reveals and what it hides.
- • The solution must address the stated need in Heart transplant allocation debate.
- • The decision must be supported by E1-E3.
- • The final product must make the success criteria visible.
- • Complete the work inside the 80-minute block.
- • Use only supplied or teacher-approved materials and evidence.
- • Do not trade , accessibility, or privacy for speed.
- • and evidence quality: must pass before scoring other criteria.
- • User need and effectiveness: highest scored criterion.
- • Time, cost, and ease of use: compare only after and effectiveness pass.
Test evidence: For each option, record the E1-E3 result that supports or fails each criterion. Do not assign a score without a named observation.
- Version or option tested
- Criterion met or missed
- Evidence ID and result
- Revision made
- Reason for the revision
- Need and user
- Criteria and constraints
- Chosen option and evidence
- Test result
- Revision and reason
Students often think Many students assume the heart should simply go to whoever is sickest, because that patient will die soonest without it.. The trap: That feels obvious, but it is a trap: the sickest patient is often the one least likely to survive the surgery, so allocation committees also weigh likelihood of success, because giving the only heart to a patient who cannot survive the operation wastes the organ and costs a life that could have been saved.
Parallel case (not tonight's prompt): A hospital during a severe flu surge has one ventilator left in the ICU, and three patients in the emergency department all need mechanical ventilation to breathe. The care team must decide who is placed on it. This is a different scarce-resource decision than the one you will argue today, but it uses the same reasoning moves, so use it only as a model of the format.\n\nMy ranking of ventilator allocation criteria:\n1. Short-term survival (likelihood the patient lives to leave the hospital with treatment)\n2. Medical need (how quickly the patient will die without the ventilator)\n3. Expected duration of use (freeing the machine sooner so it can help others)\n\nClaim: When one ventilator must be shared among several patients who all need it, the hospital should place it with the patient who has the highest likelihood of surviving the immediate illness with that support.\n\nEvidence: In a surge, ventilators are a scarce resource, and the standard goal of crisis-standard-of-care guidelines is to save the most lives with the equipment available. A patient with a strong chance of recovering from the acute illness is likely to be weaned off the ventilator and survive to discharge, while a patient whose organs are already failing for other reasons may not survive even with the machine. Choosing by short-term survival directs the limited resource toward the outcome it can actually produce.\n\nReasoning: Short-term survival connects the decision to the purpose of the resource. A ventilator buys time for lungs to recover, so it does the most good for a patient whose body can use that time to heal. Ranking medical need second still matters, because among patients with similar survival odds the one closest to dying without support should go first, but urgency alone is not enough if the patient is unlikely to survive regardless. Expected duration of use ranks third because a shorter course frees the machine for the next patient, extending the benefit beyond one person.\n\nTradeoff I acknowledge: Prioritizing short-term survival can mean turning away a patient who is sicker and more frightened right now in favor of someone with better odds, which feels unfair to the person in front of you. There is a real tension between honoring immediate need and using a scarce machine where it saves the most lives, and any rule I pick resolves that tension in one direction while giving up something in the other.
This model shows the level of evidence and organization needed to complete: Parallel worked model of the bioethics debate target: a ranked set of allocation criteria for a different scarce resource, with a one-sentence justification for the top choice and an acknowledged tradeoff. Use it to see the format and depth, then build your own ranking for tonight's prompt.
- Name the prompt or task.
- Answer it directly with the key evidence.
- Check that the response matches the requested format.
Keep the structure. Replace the question, facts, measurements, and evidence. Then recheck units, vocabulary, and whether the conclusion goes beyond the evidence.
Also due today: Record two points for each side from the committee debate before you submit.
- CER:
- Claim, Evidence, Reasoning: make a claim, back it with evidence, explain your reasoning.
- SOP:
- Standard Operating Procedure, the exact steps to follow (especially in a lab).
- Tracker:
- Your PLTW progress log where you record completed evidence.
- myPLTW:
- The PLTW course site where you do the online activities. Find it in Clever with your Microsoft sign-in, right next to Schoology.
Tap the speaker to hear a term. Add two of these to your notebook glossary with a definition and an example in your own words.
Pick just 2 or 3 words from today and make them yours: write what each one means in your own words, name the context clue or evidence that helped, then give one example from what you actually did in Heart transplant allocation debate. Try your own words first; the glossary is there if you get stuck. This is voluntary and counts as extra credit, so keep it short.
Saved on this device. Show Mr. Mendoza or add these to your notebook glossary to claim the extra credit.
Hand-picked readings, videos, and interactives for this lesson, all free and from authoritative open organizations (NIH, CDC, OpenStax, Khan Academy, PhET, HHMI, and more).
A fillable, Cornell-style notebook for Unit 3: Adventure Awaits. Type your notes, cues, and summaries right in the PDF, or print it and write by hand. Each lesson page has a cue column, a notes column, and a summary box, plus dated lab-record pages you can turn in.
HBS Unit 3 notebook: Adventure Awaits Fillable PDFCornell notes + lab recordsOpenVetted readings and references for this unit. Use them to prepare, to catch up if you were absent, or to go deeper on today's target.
Check yourself · commit, then reveal▸
Claim ceiling for this check: The supplied lesson evidence can support an observation, pattern, classroom mechanism, or next-step decision about Heart transplant allocation debate. It cannot by itself prove causation, establish a real clinical diagnosis, or justify action outside this classroom task.
A committee has one donor heart. Patient A is the sickest but has a 20 percent chance of surviving surgery. Patient B is less sick with an 80 percent chance of survival. Give one defensible argument for choosing each patient.
Write an answer and pick a confidence to unlock the key.
Fast retrieval with instant answers, not the commit-then-reveal check above. Try each from memory first: write what you remember about the earlier units, then check yourself here.
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What today's skills lead to. These are real health-science careers this course builds toward. Tap one to see, on the US Department of Labor's O*NET site, what the job actually involves, what it pays, and how fast it is growing.
Debate whether donor hearts should prioritize urgency, likelihood of success, or wait-time; record two points per side.
Then submit your Exit ticket. Turn this in at the drop folder with your district Microsoft sign-in, or hand it to Mr. Mendoza in class. Both count as submitted. Doing the activity in myPLTW does not.
Class still runs. Complete the online activity above (it's self-guided). Need the concept taught without a teacher? Use this authoritative explainer:
MedlinePlus: Electrocardiogram (EKG/ECG)You've passed Unit 2, so the optional extra-credit track is open. Complete reserved-unit work from home, including virtual labs, for extra credit. Each item shows its correct submission route.
Open the extra-credit track- CompleteEvery required part of the artifact is present, nothing left blank.
- AccurateThe science and the data are correct and match the evidence.
- Scientific reasoningYou explain your claim with evidence and reasoning (CER), not just an answer.
- Professional communicationClear, organized, labeled, and written the way a clinician or scientist would.
- SubmittedTurned in the right way, on the class site or handed to Mr. Mendoza in class, and confirmed. Not in Schoology: that is where the report-card grade appears later.