another story that speaks for itself

Hospital Halts Organ Program


St. Vincent center in L.A. says a patient, 52nd on liver transplant list, got improper priority and the action was covered up. By Charles Ornstein, Times Staff Writer

St. Vincent Medical Center, one of the largest organ transplantation centers in the state, has suspended its liver program after discovering that its doctors improperly arranged for a transplant to a Saudi national using an organ that should have gone to a much higher priority patient at another hospital, officials said. Hospital staff members then falsified documents several times to cover up the alleged maneuver, pretending that the transplant was for a patient who was near the top of the regional waiting list, hospital President and Chief Executive Gus Valdespino confirmed Monday.
The transplant took place in September 2003 and was paid for by the Royal Embassy of Saudi Arabia. But Valdespino said the problem was discovered only this month when officials were responding to routine questions from auditors at the United Network for Organ Sharing, the nonprofit group that administers the national transplant system.The patient who received the successful transplant was actually 52nd on the list, which covers much of Southern California and takes into account such factors as who is sickest and who has been waiting longest. A patient at UCLA Medical Center was entitled to receive the organ and St. Vincent should have declined it, Valdespino said.Transplant directors and ethicists from across the country say what is alleged to have happened at St. Vincent is a sin in organ transplantation, which is heavily regulated by a procurement network, as well as state and federal officials, to maintain integrity and fairness in the process. The idea of moving one patient above another for other than medical reasons is "totally unconscionable," said Dr. Douglas Hanto, chief of the transplant division at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston. "It's wrong unequivocally.".........