Kilmer17 Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 3 years ago. Apparently (no confirmation in print yet) the INS learned of her exist3nce after her name was put on the donor list but didnt do anything about it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JimboDaMan Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 "The solution is to not let illegal aliens on a donor list in the first place." Swap in a card-carrying dittohead in place of this poor girl and you still have two sets of organs wasted thru lack of attention and/or incompetence. I wouldn't say excluding aliens is a solution to any of this. But it is a defensible policy depending on your view of things. I'm more disturbed by the delay in going public with the screwup, and especially the decision to perform the second transplant. That one had to have an extremely remote chance of success and that is supposed to be a factor in choosing the recipient. I can't help but think it was done in a desperate attempt to save the doctors' arses. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NavyDave Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 I do look at it from the human point of view but now all I'm hearing is lawsuits that can result in hurting US citizens who will need these surgeries in the future. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
@DCGoldPants Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 They aren't going to stop transplants because of this. It'll only mean that the process of double and most likely triple checking these organs will be more common. Will that cost more money? yes Will that bother you if one day you get a transplant which while being checked was found to be wrong and was replaced with the proper one? no Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NavyDave Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 I learned while enlisted that having your own blood for surgery is the way to go and with my rather large and loving family, outside of the heart we can donate an organ for one of us to continue something still rare among the homies and homegirls. Its gonna take private citizens and businesses who dont need hablas for cheap labor to control the border and sue those organizations that try to hinder them from doing so. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gbear Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 I understand and even agree with the arguement that says we the tax payers are ultimately paying a lot for these mistakes. That's sad, and we should suck it up. I'd be all for limiting liability claims. I don't think the docs tried to kill her. Quite frankly, they certainly didn't benefit from her death, and I doubt the hospital would have benefited from her life. There's almost no way she could have paid for the procedure and recovery care. Few of us could. Arguements I don't agree with:those based on two Americans died for her, and that's wrong. I'm not sure I like arguements that say an American life is worth more than an immigrants. They're all humans. Of course, I see those arguements on this board all the time. No wonder we're considered an arrogant country. I'm also not quite clear that 2 Americans did in fact die for her. As I understand the organ donation process, there's a limited time to get organs to the recipient. Also, in most cases the recipient is chosen with particular interest being paid to BOTH the patients need and the chances for success. I know when discovery health channel did their bit on heart transplants (replayed all the time) they interviewed a guy who was passed over because he got sick and was basically just bumped to next available. So my question is with a chance for success being 10% on the second one, doesn't that mean there wasn't anybody with as pressing a need to whom they could get the heart to in time that had a better chance for a heart. Yes, people die waiting on those lists...but that doesn't mean they could have been saved with those organs. Also, somebody raised the how long would she have lived anyway arguement, I can't answer that. However, people with other major organ donations go on to live long productive lives. I know kidney and liver transplants tend to do alright if they can get through the recovery period where their immune system is knocked down. All in all, I can't say I'm against a medical system that tries to help all those in critical need who come through the door. I don't care if the person is rich or poor, black or white, American or Mexican. If they're dieing and we can do something about it, we should do it. Priorites...lives over money...I'm okay with that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kilmer17 Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 The fact remains that she got 2 organ transplants that would have gone to 2 Americans. Whether a life would have been saved or not isn't the issue. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NavyDave Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 The need for organs compared to available organs is obvious. And it was 4 organs that could have saved four Americans. If all lives are equal then why are the anti bush crowd demanding that we dont save the iraqi citizens from Saddam? Not to sound cruel but if it came down to 4 americans and one illegal alien I'm choosing the four americans Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
@DCGoldPants Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 or would of gone to two other people of other nationalities that came to the U.S. and paid for the transplant. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kilmer17 Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 If she had come here legally I would have no problem with it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NavyDave Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 I just wonder if Americans with out any insurance or lack of funds like her family would have received the same care and urgent search for organs to keep Jethro, Betty sue, Shaquita or Tyrone from the hood alive? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tex Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 This poor girl needed help and I don't want to sound heartless but how in the heck could an illegal get help when US citizens go begging? http://www.examiner.net/stories/071502/new_071502006.shtml Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gbear Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 Navy, at no point in time was the choice her life vs. 4 Americans. She needed a heart and lung transfer. At each point, if it worked like the system is supposed to, they looked at her needs, the outlook on her life if she got the transplant and the likelyhood that she would live until the next available transplant vs. the next guy's needs, lieklyhood of successful surgery/recovery, and ability to wait for the next transplant. It's always a one to one choice. It's heartbreaking, and it sucks that she was given multiple chances, but that just means the chances were worse (without hindsight) for the other uses for the organs. How do you even know there was another exact matched recipient sitting in the hospital ready for surgery at the time? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tarhog Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 Originally posted by gbear Navy, at no point in time was the choice her life vs. 4 Americans. She needed a heart and lung transfer. At each point, if it worked like the system is supposed to, they looked at her needs, the outlook on her life if she got the transplant and the likelyhood that she would live until the next available transplant vs. the next guy's needs, lieklyhood of successful surgery/recovery, and ability to wait for the next transplant. It's always a one to one choice. It's heartbreaking, and it sucks that she was given multiple chances, but that just means the chances were worse (without hindsight) for the other uses for the organs. How do you even know there was another exact matched recipient sitting in the hospital ready for surgery at the time? gbear....you are only partly correct. The first transplant, ignoring the 'americans first' part of the discussion, was essentially routine. They had a patient in need, a supposed organ donor match, and the surgery was conducted. The 2nd tragedy here was that they wasted another set of organs on someone who had statistically almost no chance of survival. Going on a heart-lung bypass machine is extremely traumatic and heart lung transplant is a lengthy, dangerous surgery. After they realized their error, it was unethical in my mind to offer another set of organs. There are thousands of people on the waiting list for these organs, and the odds that this little girl was the only match for a second set of organs is extremely unlikely. Its quite possible a US citizen (or for that matter, someone of another nationality) has or will die because they were denied that second set of organs. I suspect, as many do, that the second set of organs was made available in order to try to assuage the family for the initial error and in a desperate attempt to rescue themselves from a public relations nightmare, not based on sound medical decision-making. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
@DCGoldPants Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 Let me ask this. If they didn't try again then wouldn't Duke of looked 10 times worse? They had only one shot at getting it right and they didn't even do that? That was a lose/lose situation for the school and the girl at the point. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fansince62 Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 gbear....your point is well taken.......but there are two separate issues: 1) I agree...drawing distinctions on whose life to save is not a business we want to get in.......once you are in the position of having to save a life........you do it....no questions asked. 2) As an illegal alien.....she should not have been in the country. I don't view this as an American vs them equation. This is a strict dollars and cents issue: we cannot afford to pay for this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
@DCGoldPants Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 who paid for it? Didn't they get donations? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kilmer17 Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 The first one was partially paid for by donors. The second was wholly subsidized. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fansince62 Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 in the aggregate...there aren't enough resources to cover all needs....hence, we can't afford to be the medical soup kitchen for all the world...... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
@DCGoldPants Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 Originally posted by Kilmer17 The first one was partially paid for by donors. The second was wholly subsidized. the 2nd one should be 100% paid for by Duke without help from anybody. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kilmer17 Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 Thats pretty unlikely unfortunately. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
@DCGoldPants Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 If a private school can't afford to cover their own mistakes and their insurance cannot. They shouldn't be practicing medicine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gbear Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 Tarhog, I thought that was kind of odd too. I wonder why no one is really harping on the issue of her lack of probable life on the second surgery. I know they mentioned while it was going on that she didn't have much of a chance. I would assume that if somebody can be bumped down on the list for having a cold becuase it reduces the chance of living through the recovery, then somebody who has almost no chance of living wouldn't be considered except as a last chance to use the organs. That she would be put ahead of others is the true travesty in the case of the seecond attempt. It's sad that she should suffer and die because of someone else's mistakes, but it's no more sad than kids not being deemed elidgable recipients because the parents won't take care of them adequately during the recovery periods, Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Art Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 There are other factors to consider here. While it's true that likely survival is a meaningful measurement in most cases, there is another factor. My uncle just had his second liver transplant. He had his first and went through, living exactly as the doctors said. He shouldn't have qualified for another organ though because the chance of the second taking and offering meaningful living is less than a first-time transplant. However, the doctors wanted to see how it took in him as he was an ideal life style guy after the first, despite getting a couple of blood diseases in the process. I suspect not only was there a desire to correct a terrible blunder in the Jessica case, but also a medical curiosity that normally couldn't have been tested. You couldn't normally test the impact of a second organ transplant caused by extreme idiocy. In this case it may be that they learn from what happened and glean valuable medical experience from the second effort, despite the girl's death. I have no idea really. It just seems as likely as anything. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
@DCGoldPants Posted February 24, 2003 Share Posted February 24, 2003 I agree with Art. For the sake of science also. If she had survived, it would of been a breakthrough find...just a bad way finding it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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