Posted on 11/23/2014 9:49:01 AM PST by Shimmer1
The organ donation process has been completed for the young woman whose family was fighting against it.
According to family members of 26-year-old Martha Perez, her organs were removed on Friday against their wishes.
Fox 4 spoke to the family before the removal and they said the third woman confirmed dead of injuries sustained in an Arlington wreck involving a suspected drunk driver was technically still alive.
more.....
In most states, there are a handful of hospitals that do transplants.
Most deaths happen where people are at the time they die. As a result, most hospitals that take care of a dying patient that wants to donate have very little to do with transplants. Most hospitals lose whatever financial interest they might have in a patient as soon as an OPO takes over.
The local docs sign off the case. The OPO’s docs take over.
A new medical record is created, with a new billing number where the hospital bills the OPO from that moment on. Because the hospitals have to cooperate with the OPOs, those bills normally are severely discounted. The hospital isn’t going to make a profit from that new bill.
For most hospitals, the only benefit from complying with donation is that it’s required by law. If you want to take a cynical approach, the hospital could make far more money by providing phenomenally expensive care to a dead patient on a ventilator, and leaving the OPO out of it. This is precisely why notifying the OPO is required by law. It protects you from being taken advantage of at the time of your death.
That statement is simply wrong on several levels. First, there is great debate over what "dead" really means. Organs aren't generally harvested from people who are clinically dead, only legally "brain dead". These standards for what constitutes brain death are not universal.
Second, in countries like China legal death sometimes includes capital convictions. I hardly think that China forcibly taking the organs from convicted thieves is pro-life.
Third, I know many people who actively volunteer for pro-life causes who have legitimate religious opposition to organ donation. They are certainly pro-life despite not being willing their organs.
Fourth, not all organs that are donated are necessary for life. I hardly think that refusing to donate corneas or facial dermis is a disqualification from being pro-life.
Finally as this case illustrates, it is becoming increasingly clear that the financial incentives for organ donation under the current legal system might be driving pro-death behavior among many of the participants. Choosing not to participate in this system because of this could be a legitimate pro-life decision.
“If that is correct, then you should be arguing on here against hospitals ending care and harvesting organs against the wishes of families. The situation in this article has done immense harm to the cause of organ donation.”
I agree with this statement, but almost every party here has their hands tied by laws created to prevent abuse.
The law requires the hospital to notify the OPO.
The law requires the OPO to respect the expressed wishes of the patient over the family.
I assure you that both the hospital and the OPO are cringing about this publicity. Neither can legally change their course of action as a result.
If you Will your possessions to someone, the law is going to protect your right to do so. This is the same concept.
I don’t want someone making donation decisions about me based on how it will affect their publicity. I’m glad the law protects my interests. If you read Bastiat’s, The Law, this is why law should exist: to enforce my interests over others, even if it’s bad PR for others.
The girl had an expressed interest in donating. She was dead. Nobody’s opinion or self-interest mattered at that point but hers.
What works within an ethical medical culture will be another creature entirely under Obamacare. Motivations and priorities will change, and the current medical professionals who refuse to adapt will be replaced by “team players”. DC is a good model for how that happens.
That may be, but the issue here is the site of the donation, not the implantation.
Most deaths happen where people are at the time they die.
I bet they are!
As a result, most hospitals that take care of a dying patient that wants to donate have very little to do with transplants.
The transplant is a two step process, and the initial surgery is done at the first hospital.
Most hospitals lose whatever financial interest they might have in a patient as soon as an OPO takes over.
Are you saying that the donating hospital isn't paid? Surely you jest.
The local docs sign off the case. The OPO’s docs take over. A new medical record is created, with a new billing number where the hospital bills the OPO from that moment on.
Again, they all benefit financially.
Because the hospitals have to cooperate with the OPOs, those bills normally are severely discounted. The hospital isn’t going to make a profit from that new bill. For most hospitals, the only benefit from complying with donation is that it’s required by law.
That is preposterous. Nothing that a hospital or doctor does in these cases is without profit. The only party not compensated in this process is the victim's estate.
If you want to take a cynical approach, the hospital could make far more money by providing phenomenally expensive care to a dead patient on a ventilator, and leaving the OPO out of it. This is precisely why notifying the OPO is required by law. It protects you from being taken advantage of at the time of your death.
Ha! So the reason reason the organ procurement organization is notified is to protect the victim?! These organizations are overriding victims' families to harvest victims organs for their own financial benefit.
Your tortured and nonsensical defense of this practice illustrates precisely why fewer people (percentage) are willing to donate their organs and the waiting lists are growing. If you really want to increase donations, you should be arguing against the decision in this case, not their critics.
Our family had a different experience. The underbelly of organ donations, taking body parts without authorization. The money drives this.
Prevent abuse, and like everything else in medicine, to create enormous financial incentives.
The law requires the hospital to notify the OPO. The law requires the OPO to respect the expressed wishes of the patient over the family.
If that is the case, you can expect far fewer people to volunteer for organ donation. The families wishes should always be a primary priority. One case like this could easily cause hundreds of people to rescind their organ donation intentions. I would expect several of the people I have already forwarded this article to do so.
I assure you that both the hospital and the OPO are cringing about this publicity. Neither can legally change their course of action as a result.
I doubt any of them are cringing at the substance of this case, only that this one was made public. If they truly wanted the families' interests to be better represented, they could work for that. Instead, the transplant "industry" is that main driver for creating these anti-family policies.
If you Will your possessions to someone, the law is going to protect your right to do so. This is the same concept.
You can't sell or even will your organs to anyone. They can only be donated, and fewer people will be willing to do so after cases like this one.
I don’t want someone making donation decisions about me based on how it will affect their publicity. I’m glad the law protects my interests. If you read Bastiat’s, The Law, this is why law should exist: to enforce my interests over others, even if it’s bad PR for others.
Yes, especially when it enforces medical entities' financial interests over the interests of families!
The girl had an expressed interest in donating. She was dead.
Legally dead, but not clinically dead. Or so said the people who benefited financially from her death. The same people who made the determination. If ever there were a life-or-death conflict of interest, this is it.
Nobody’s opinion or self-interest mattered at that point but hers.
Certainly not her family's. Like most people, she almost assuredly would have wanted her family making a decision like that instead of people who would profit from her death. Again, you can expect cases like this, and arguments of people like you defending them, to result in fewer people will to donate their organs.
The families wishes should always be a primary priority.
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The donors’ wishes should always be the priorities.
I would be pissed to find out my children decided their precious feelings trumped my direct request.
This is about trying to blame someone. It’s not about the donors wishes.
Your delusions about who benefits are so far from reality that it is impossible to argue against you.
you are free to think any way you want. You are free to be a donor or not. You are NOT free to overrule the specific directives of an adult just because you don’t agree. It doesn’t work that way.
You might not be capable of anger at that point. And my condolences about your apparent poor relationship with your children.
This is about trying to blame someone. It’s not about the donors wishes.
In this case there was no dispute about the patients wishes between the patient's family and the medical personnel, only the timing and the incentive for overriding the family's wishes about the timing.
Your delusions about who benefits are so far from reality that it is impossible to argue against you.
Well that sure is a constructive argument you make there. I can see why you don't have a positive relationship with your children!
you are free to think any way you want.
Why thank you very much!
You are free to be a donor or not.
Really? I wasn't aware of that.
You are NOT free to overrule the specific directives of an adult just because you don’t agree. It doesn’t work that way.
If my family can't override what I said at the DMV after standing in line for 45 minutes based on what I told them since then, I won't be a donor. And you know what, I bet most people who currently are willing to donate won't either.
“Are you saying that the donating hospital isn’t paid? Surely you jest.?”
The hospital where the donation happens receives no money from the receiving hospital. The OPO is the middle man, and by law, they are not-for-profits. Once donation is decided, the receiving hospital is only paid what is contracted between them and the OPO. That money is based on a contract that in most cases isn’t enough to pay expenses incurred. The hospitals have a legal obligation to assist and that obligation creates a situation where the hospitals do not have the leverage to negotiate large financial gains from the process.
You think this is preposterous only because you want to imagine bogeymen out to steal your organs. In reality, there are laws here that protect against that very thing. Also, in reality, most health care practitioners are actually invested in taking care of people. Your accusations about real people working in the trenches to save lives, as agents out to kill you off to steal your organs are silly. It is your conspiracy fantasies that are preposterous.
Donations save lives.
I don’t think the ME would have examined the body before the organs were harvested so the ME is only saying what the hospital said.
Does the OPO examine the patient? NO. The OPO does not do the actual harvesting either So you only have the hospital s and they aren’t saying anything.
and we know Hospitals never make mistakes don’t we?
It might all be above board but there is also the possibility mistakes were made
As more and more family members and friends learned of her situation I was shocked at the lack of understanding and downright misinformation that was out there.
It seems one poster refuses to believe what some of us already knew, but maybe others who were not knowledgeable will now open their eyes.
You must be alive when they harvest your organs.
I am not sure I understand what the family member Juan Martinez was saying here. Is he saying that she was still breathing before she was taken off like support or she was still breathing after she was taken off life support? And if she was still breathing after life support was removed, for how long? What exactly did this family member witness? I presume that she remained on “life support” until sometime on Friday and pretty much right up until the time her organs were taken for transplantation, as she was an organ donor, she would not have been removed from it two or even one day or even 12 or 6 or I hour earlier as that would have rendered most of her organs unsuitable for transplant. I feel like there are some facts perhaps missing from this story.
I am not sure, but it is my understanding that a person meeting the clinical definition of brain death, may have some very limited lower brain stem function left, although brain stem death, the lack of any electrical function of the brain stem, is I believe the norm for evaluating complete brain death along with many other clinical evaluations, performed not by one but by several doctors. FWIW, the heart also will continue to beat for a time after brain death without life support as the heart can continue beating independent from input from the brain. A human heart, if provided with nothing more than oxygen will continue to beat outside and completely removed from the human body for a time.
As for breathing, respiration will not continue for very long in a brain dead person once life support is removed, however an individual may exhibit spinal activity or reflexes such as twitching or muscle contractions. Spinal reflexes are caused by electrical impulses that remain in the spinal column. These reflexes may occur even though the brain is dead and these can be mistaken by a relative as signs of life or even breathing as the muscles in the chest can continue to move up and down for a time after they are removed from the ventilator. But that does not mean the person is breathing on their own.
No. Not exactly. You are clinically dead, brain dead when your organs are removed for transplantation to another in order to save the life of another, but your organs must be kept functioning , receive blood flow and oxygen via artificial life support long enough to keep those organs viable for transplantation.
For certain organs that is murder
The OPO does their own independent testing. Since this is the result of an accident, the ME would have been called to the bedside at the time of death, on Wed.
You have three organizations, separate and distinct from one another, all coming to the same conclusion: she died on Wed.
None of these organizations will make a profit on the donation. The ME is only involve to sign the death cert. the hospital where the patient is located stops making money once the OPO takes over, and the OPO is not for profit.
There is no conspiracy here. This woman died. It was her wish to donate. She did.
Don't see where there is any room for debate.
This girl was breathing on her own. She was not on life support. Yet they took her organs.
If I'm breathing on my own, I don't want my organs taken like that. Her family didn't either.
Re the notion of 'brain dead' the definition varies by location.
The girl wasn’t breathing on her own. She was dead. By definition, you cannot breathe on your own and also be dead.
Three medical organizations said she was dead, by definition, incapable of breathing on her own.
One grieving family member said otherwise, desperate to believe something that just wasn’t reality.
The definition of brain dead isn’t interchangeable like you suggest. Brain dead is brain dead. There are multiple tests that can be performed, and different places require different criteria as to how many methods, and how many different practitioners must agree, but the result is the same: brain dead is brain dead.
The girl died on Wed. She wasn’t breathing on her own. Who says? The ME, her doctor (who has to certify death before the OPO can take over), another doctor (because Texas law requires two docs sign off on brain death), and the OPO all say she died on Wed. She donated two days after her death.
She died. She wanted to donate. She did. Her final act was heroic. Donations save lives.
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