New Liver Transplant Rules Begin Amid Fight Over Fairness

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Associated Press

New rules aim to make liver transplant wait depend less on ZIP code, but some hospitals tell court the change isn't fair.
By Associated Press, Wire Service Content May 14, 2019, at 1:27 p.m.



This Aug. 17, 2017 photo provided by Wendy Gomez, fourth from left, in April 2019 shows her wife, Wilnelia Cruz-Ulloa, third from left, with their children and stepchildren on their wedding day in New York. Cruz-Ulloa spent the last months of her life in a New York City ICU, waiting for a donated liver that never came. Doctors had urged the 38-year-old mother to move _ other states have more organs to go around. But she couldn't afford to. (Latisha Ozuna/Wendy Gomez via AP) THE ASSOCIATED PRESS


WASHINGTON (AP) — Wilnelia Cruz-Ulloa spent the last months of her life in a New York City hospital, waiting for a donated liver that never came. Doctors had urged the 38-year-old to move to another state that has more organs to go around. But she couldn’t afford to.

Where you live makes a difference in how sick you have to be to get a transplant, or if you’ll die waiting. Now the nation’s transplant system is aiming to make the wait for livers, and eventually all organs, less dependent on your ZIP code. New rules mandating wider sharing of donated livers went into effect Tuesday despite a fierce and ongoing hospital turf war in federal court.

“Whoever’s sickest should have the greatest opportunity” for an organ, said Dr. Sander Florman, a transplant surgeon at New York’s Mount Sinai Medical Center who helped care for Cruz-Ulloa and pushed for the change. “This woman would be alive if the new rules were in place, or if she’d lived somewhere else.”

But more than a dozen hospitals in parts of the Midwest and South sued to block the change, arguing it will endanger their patients, especially in rural areas, if livers must be shipped further to areas with fewer donations. Late Monday, a judge in Atlanta denied their request to put the rules on hold until the legal challenge is decided. The next day, those hospitals appealed, still seeking to halt the rules after they began.


Read more: https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/articles/2019-05-14/new-liver-transplant-rules-begin-amid-fight-over-fairness

[dameatball]

1. I just renewed my driver's license yesterday and checked "yes" in the organ donors box. I wonder if

offering a discounted price for renewals to those who check that donor box might make some small increase in organ availability.

[Fix The Stupid]

2. That's a great idea. n/t

[eggplant]

4. I think that pretty much equates to selling your organs.

Even if it is only for a token amount. The poor, who already struggle to pay fees like their driver's license renewal, would risk being subject to coercion.

[dameatball]

5. You mean like the people that sell blood at blood banks? It's common. They save a lot of lives.

I don't consider that coercion. I do get where you are coming from but it does end up being something good that comes from an individual's choice. Years ago I worked a part-time job at night for a blood bank. I can recall driving onto a tarmac at a major Southeastern airport to deliver a cold packed specimen to a jet getting ready to take off. (Pre-9/11, so not sure it still works that way). This stuff saves lives.
I think this proposal has probably been heard and argued before and it may not make much of a dent in the number of deaths, but I think it is a positive step. People are dying as it stands.

I'll have to give that coercion response some thought. I had not looked at it that way. Not sure I agree, but there may be something there.


One thing that people may not realize when they donate blood. Platelets and other by products are used in a variety of ways which make blood banks more profitable. I may be dating myself, but at one time the blood components were used in many ways, including cosmetics.
Maybe the technology has changed. Lots of people making big money off the "donate" campaigns, so why shouldn't the little guy catch a small break? Check out the salaries that some of the CEO's of these "non-profits" are pulling in, especially in major population areas.

[eggplant]

6. No, actually. There is a difference.

[dameatball]

7. Sorry, I was editing the post and I appreciate what you are saying. Your solution?

Last edited Tue May 14, 2019, 08:49 PM - Edit history (1)

[eggplant]

8. I think the driver's license registration works well.

It makes sense for there to be a single place to register, to avoid confusion. Here in NY, there is an active push to sign up for it. For people without a DL, maybe a simple on-line form for printing out a page to stick in your wallet.

Combining either of these with medical info (allergies, medical conditions, etc) that would be useful to EMT/Paramedic/ER people might help as well.

[MicaelS]

3. I did not know this.

I always thought it was who was sickest got the organ.