Transplant surgeon charged in death of man with disabilities
February 26th, 2008
From the New York Times:
In what is believed to be the first such case in the country, a California transplant surgeon is facing three felony counts relating to charges that he tried to hasten the death of a disabled and brain damaged man in order to harvest his organs sooner.
By most accounts, Ruben Navarro, 25, was very near death, and doctors hoped that he might sustain other lives by donating his kidneys and liver. Dr. Hootan Roozrokh is accused of prescribing excessive drugs to hasten his death.
Dr. Roozrokh has pleaded not guilty, and his lawyer said the charges were the result of overzealous prosecutors. But the case has already sent a shudder through the tight-knit field of transplant surgeons, because if convicted on all counts, Dr. Roozrokh could face eight years in prison. The case is also worrying donation advocacy groups that organ donors could be frightened away.
Mr. Navarro’s mother has filed a civil suit against Dr. Roozrokh, the donor network and other doctors in the operating room, and says she is angry about the way her son’s life ended.
“He didn’t deserve to be like that, to go that way,” she said. “He died without dignity and sympathy and without respect.”
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on Tuesday, February 26th, 2008 at 8:29 pm and is filed under criminal justice, disabilities, mental health.
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February 29th, 2008 at 8:58 am
Organ transplantation connects with people with disability in two ways:
1) Ensuring that people with a developmental disability receive donated organs for their medical needs, just as do other people; and
2) Removing organs from people immediately after death only with full ethical protections against undesired deceased donation.
The second aspect is important, because the great majority of potential donors have a disability — that is, cannot communicate — when the decision for organ donation occurs.
Some newspaper articles are inaccurate, so at this time, I do not know what happened in this case in fact. But the two essential rules to maintain full protection and to avoid conflict of interest are:
A) For a person who is a potential deceased organ donor, the transplant team be NOT involved in ANY way in the care that dying person (including determining if the person is brain dead); and
B) The transplant team stays COMPLETELY out of the person’s room until after the potential donor person dies.
Bill