Refusal to make anatomical gift — Effect of refusal · Tennessee
Tennessee: how to refuse organ donation
If you came here to get off the registry
Is removing the donor designation enough in Tennessee?
Taking your name off the organ donor registry is a revocation. So is removing the designation from your driver’s license. Under Tenn. Code Ann. § 68-30-108, Tennessee law treats a revocation and a refusal as two different things, and only the refusal settles it.
A revocation withdraws the gift you made. It does not stop anyone else from making the gift for you. Only a refusal does that, and Tenn. Code Ann. § 68-30-107 is the section that says so. It has to be signed.
Both provisions are quoted in full below, from Tennessee’s own code.
What Tennessee asks
What you need to make a refusal in Tennessee
- Act
- 2006 revision, renumbered by the state
- Enforcement
- An unrevoked refusal bars all other persons from making the gift.
- Signing it yourself
- No witnesses required by the statute.
- If someone signs at your direction
- Two adults. At least one of the two must be a disinterested witness; the other may be anyone, including a family member.
- Notary
- Not required.
- Tennessee law
- Tenn. Code Ann. §§ 68-30-107, 68-30-108
- Statute read
- 2026-09-02
Refusal to make anatomical gift — Effect of refusal · Preclusive effect of anatomical gift, amendment or revocation
The statute itself
Quoted from Tennessee’s enacted code, in full and unedited.
How a refusal is made (unlettered)
An individual may refuse to make an anatomical gift of the individual's body or part by a writing signed in the same manner as a document of gift or any other writing used to identify the individual as refusing to make an anatomical gift. A terminal patient may refuse to make an anatomical gift by oral statement or other form of communication.
Tenn. Code Ann. § 68-30-107
How it must be witnessed
A donor or other person authorized to make an anatomical gift under § 68-30-104 may make a gift by a donor card or other record signed by the donor or other person making the gift ... If the donor or other person is physically unable to sign a record, the record may be signed by another individual at the direction of the donor or other person and shall: (1) Be witnessed by at least two (2) adults, at least one (1) of whom is a disinterested witness, who have signed at the request of the donor or the other person; and (2) State that it has been signed and witnessed as provided in subdivision (b)(1).
Tenn. Code Ann. § 68-30-105(b) · Document-of-gift execution, reached by § 68-30-107
What an unrevoked refusal does (none)
Tennessee's § 68-30-107 has no subsections and contains no sentence corresponding to uniform § 7(d). The statute does not state that an unrevoked refusal bars all other persons; the barring effect must be drawn from § 68-30-108 and § 68-30-109.
Tenn. Code Ann. § 68-30-107
A revocation is not a refusal (second undesignated paragraph)
A donor's revocation of an anatomical gift of the donor's body or part under § 68-30-105 is not a refusal and does not bar another person specified in § 68-30-104 or § 68-30-109 from making an anatomical gift of the donor's body or part.
Tenn. Code Ann. § 68-30-108