USC transplants kidney into wrong person

USC transplants kidney into wrong person

latimesblogs.latimes.com

USC University Hospital shut down its kidney transplant program last month after a kidney was accidentally transplanted into the wrong patient, according to a spokesman for the program that coordinates organ transplants in Los Angeles.

The patient escaped harm apparently because the mistake involved a kidney that happened to be a close enough match, said Bryan Stewart, a spokesman for One Legacy, which was notified of the error by the hospital.

In a statement, the hospital confirmed that it had temporarily and voluntarily halted transplants Jan. 29 after a “process error” was discove

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Welcome to the big money world of corporate medicine where about the only thing bigger than the money is the all to frequent mistakes, you would think would never happen in something as critical as a vital organ transplant.

Great News the hospital states, the person who ‘accidentally’ had their good kidney removed, to receive a donated one in error, no doubt some desperately ill person had waited months or years for, was the same blood and tissue type so no harm was done!

Just the waste of an all too precious donated organ, hundreds of thousands of dollars, and the ‘minor’ inconvenience to a sick person who gets to keep on being sick, who could have instead been well on the road to recovery now had competent people and procedures been involved.

Forget about the marring and scarring perfectly well person’s body, or that they might have been exposed to blood born diseases during the wasteful operation through transfusions during the surgery.

The sad reality is even in the hospital you are just another number on a computer screen and plastic wristband in all too impersonal process where people are paid huge dollars to make huge mistakes.

What tells me that the person who received this Kidney in error is going to end up spending months if not years arguing a bill their insurance company will no doubt deny, since they didn’t need a Kidney Transplant?

Welcome to Corporate America where the bottom line profits seem to be the only thing that really matters.


latimesblogs.latimes.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

I hope to hell he is not charged for anything by the hospital...which I think will be the case since the hospital volunteered the information/release...

How in the hell you transplant a kidney into the wrong person just baffles me. This is a failure on so many levels, but ultimately it will fall in the laps of the doctors and nurses in the OR, as it should. These large hospitals have very expensive, and very good lawyers, and you can bet these same doctors and nurses will be left flailing in the wind.

I am an RN at a very large hospital here in NE Ohio. A few years back a woman who had a lung transplant where I work died several years after receiving this lung transplant. When they performed her autopsy it was found that a towel had been left in her chest cavity during the operation. Naturally her family tried suing the hospital.

They of course lost, and the hospitals official statement was, "the family should be grateful as this towel gave them a few extra years with their loved one because it expanded her chest cavity and allowed for extra room for the transplanted lungs to function, thus extending her life beyond that which is expected following a surgery of this nature."

These large hospitals don't care about you or your loved ones. They operate more like a production line at a factory than an institution tasked with treating the sick and dying.

reply to post by ProtoplasmicTraveler


Holy CRAP!!! What is with this world today!! Chances are the person who recieved the kidney will eventually not live. Becuase a CLOSE match is NOT good enough! WOW! I'm speechless over this one.

The patient escaped harm apparently because the mistake involved a kidney that happened to be a close enough match

The truly sad part is that this person who received the kidney in error will now,unnecessarily, be on anti-rejection medications for the rest of their life. Medications that not only come with nasty side effects, but also come at a very hefty price.

"What tells me that the person who received this Kidney in error is going to end up spending months if not years arguing a bill their insurance company will no doubt deny, since they didn’t need a Kidney Transplant?"

Actually this person should be able to pay it off just fine, with the multi-million dollar lawsuit they will most surely win.


Deebo

Originally posted by ProtoplasmicTraveler




Just the waste of an all too precious donated organ, hundreds of thousands of dollars, and the ‘minor’ inconvenience to a sick person who gets to keep on being sick, who could have instead been well on the road to recovery now had competent people and procedures been involved.


The sad reality is even in the hospital you are just another number on a computer screen and plastic wristband in all too impersonal process where people are paid huge dollars to make huge mistakes.



latimesblogs.latimes.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

A personal story here, but it will just reiterate the waste and incompetency in the field of organ transplant.

My 26 yr old son had an accident on May21st, 2010. Within 48 hours he was almost completely brain dead, ( I say almost because this is a gray area and to go into that aspect would take ages) but he was on a ventilator and having uncontrollable seizure activity with catastrophic brain injury.

After an agonizing 2 weeks, we were faced with a parents worst nightmare... discontinuing life support.
The only good that could come of this, we felt, was organ donation.

We spoke with the transplant team at length and let me tell you this in itself is a completely overwhelming process. They explained how my son could potentially save the lives of up to 80 people using organs, skin, bone, tissue etc. Under the circumstances after being worn down from the 2 weeks that had already passed, it was even more unbearable. We spent hours going over his entire life history, what we agreed to be procured, signing form after form after form. They knew everything about my son, including that he had an 18 month old daughter.The formalities finalized, we said our goodbyes and left the hospital for the last time.

Twelve hours later we were called back in by the CEO of the hospital only to learn that none of what we agreed to would happen. Since my son had a child, we had to start a court process of obtaining legal guardianship of him and then request permission from the mother of this child, on behalf of his child to discontinue life support. This took an additional 8 weeks. Eight weeks he laid in an ICU bed wasting away. 8 Weeks of drugs to keep the seizure activity at bay rendered all of his organs useless.

How did the transplant team not know this protocol? They certainly knew he had this child. Was my son the first person to be in the position to donate his organs with a child? I certainly do not think so. The fact is, they botched this big time, and yes, most likely people who could have been helped died.

Normally, the minute you signed the papers, the transplant organization became responsible for the medical bills incurred from that point forward, a little fact you might not know had you never been in my position. Since they were never able to complete the procurement, they did not end up being the responsible party.

In the end, the only people who profited from this was the Hospital who was able to rack up massive bills from the extended time in the most expensive bed in the hospital.
Insult added to injury.

reply to post by ProtoplasmicTraveler


Well at least it has not gone as bad as it did for the man in the story below. At least not for now. Who knows, next week the headlines may tell us that it wasn't even a kidney that they transplanted. After carefully reviewing the entire procedure we have come to the realization that we actually put someone's defunct heart in place of the good kidney! Oh how the surgical team laughed! Oh well he seems to be doing fine.

June 3, 2010 Family Sues After Man Received Cancerous Kidney

AP News is reporting a quite bizarre medical malpractice story. A man received a transplanted kidney from a woman who had uterine cancer and was unaware of it. He was not told that there was cancer within the kidney until almost two months after the transplant. The man decided to keep the kidney after his doctor advised him that there was only a slim chance that he could be sickened by the feminine cancer. His lawyer stated that this advice is what caused the man to lose his life. The man had previously been on three-times-a-week dialysis and had been awaiting a kidney for about five years. The medical malpractice case has gone to trial and the plaintiff is arguing that the doctor took a huge risk with the victim’s life. Though the post-op tests found nothing, the victim suffered back pain and ultimately had the kidney removed six months after the transplant. The victim died about three weeks later of the cancer that came from his donor.

medicalmalpractice.levinperconti.com...