Medical marijuana user dies for lack of liver transplant

[Rusty Heap]

I'm sorta stunned by the actions of the medical community over this.

Your thoughts/comments? A guy with doctors approval for medical marijuana use, was denied a liver transplant, BECAUSE he used pot. What a cluster fluck. They wanted him to go through rehab? This guy was sick sick sick, on his death bed, and politics got in the way, and yup, he died.........

Local News | Medical marijuana user dies for lack of liver transplant | Seattle Times Newspaper

[fintstone]

Sounds reasonable to me. Why use a rare liver transplant on someone who is a high risk instead of someone who is not? An admitted previous intravenous drug user who was still using marijuana?

[jorian]

Love the compassion fint. You've got me all torn up.

[fintstone]

That is why they decide by panel. Why give a transplant to someone who clearly has a higher likelihood of failure when there are many who need the transplant with better chances? This fellow brought his problems on himself with his risky and illegal activities. Sure I feel sorry for him...but would give the liver to someone else.

[Jeff Higgins]

Originally Posted by fintstone

Sounds reasonable to me. Why use a rare liver transplant on someone who is a high risk instead of someone who is not? An admitted previous intravenous drug user who was still using marijuana?

Like David Crosby?

[3.2 CAB]

He had enough money to buy a new one!

[Nathans_Dad]

As in most news stories, I am pretty sure there is more to the story than what the paper has decided to print. Transplant decisions are made based on multiple factors, recent drug use being one of them.

[Jeff Higgins]

Originally Posted by Nathans_Dad

As in most news stories, I am pretty sure there is more to the story than what the paper has decided to print. Transplant decisions are made based on multiple factors, recent drug use being one of them.

The Seattle Times is notorious around here; I wouldn't even use it to wrap fish. Their liberal slant is unmistakable. I'm sure there is much, much more to the story that neither the reporter nor the editor felt we needed to read.

[Aurel]

Would you transplant a shiny 3.6L motor with 15,000 miles on it in a old rusted 911E tub with a bent frame? Though decision...

Aurel

[on2wheels52]

I don't imagine they threw the donor liver away rather than give it to him, how about a story on the person who got it?
Jim

[Porsche-O-Phile]

Ever had a speeding ticket? Ever had any kind of indiscretion in your life at all?

I guess there go your chances for an organ (should you ever need one) based on this "logic". Why should they waste potential organs on someone if they ever need a transplant since they have an obvious history of participating in dangerous activity that will likely result in premature injury/death, right? Keep the organs for the ones that are pure and virgin as the driven snow. Like Rush Limbaugh. Oops, scratch that. Umm. . . Jesse Helms? Drat. Maybe Jerry Falwell? Nope. Hmm. Karl Rove?

I guess the only difference is that technically speeding is illegal and pot smoking under a doctor's order is legal (both in WA and CA now I believe).

This is a complete bunch of B.S. The politicians stand to lose one of their biggest "cash cow" excuses to keep taxes high on the populace with their "war on drugs" crap that's been a failure since it was initiated back under the Reagan administration. Got news for ya'. We can't win that war either. It's just a convenient excuse for the politicians and bureaucrats to keep themselves in control and keep taxing/regulating the populace ("if we cut taxes, we won't be able to crack down on drug dealers!"). It's about the same level of scholarship/intellectual validity as "won't someone please think of the children!" Stupid, sensationalist nonsense designed to preserve the status quo by riling up the ignorant.

Anyhoo, there's your "reasoning" behind the war on drugs. Well, that and because Jesus sez that marijuana is an evil substance. And the cotton lobby of course. But that's not important. And never mind the fact that if you believe that god made the world, he obviously made marijuana, cocoa, poppy and other "evil" plants too. But that's not important either.

It's laughable how America gets so hung up on these innane pseudo-religious platitudes while the ROW is kicking our asses in everything else that matters. I guess it's more important to uphold our own delusions of greatness and moral superiority.

[Por_sha911]

Can any out you medical experts that have posted your distaste for the decision tell me if smoking pot would have hurt the success rate of the transplant for some medical reason like a reaction with the drugs needed to avoid rejection? And, please, no "I think..."

[sammyg2]

Pot is illegal. It also hurts your liver. Why transplant a liver into some mushhead who will just take illegal drugs and trash it? I wouldn't.

[sjf911]

Originally Posted by Por_sha911

Can any out you medical experts that have posted your distaste for the decision tell me if smoking pot would have hurt the success rate of the transplant for some medical reason like a reaction with the drugs needed to avoid rejection? And, please, no "I think..."

The ability to comply with the medical regimen necessary to suppress rejection is one of the most important factors as is long term survival potential after surgery. However, he appeared to be pre-morbid and in hospice so it makes me wonder if he was felt by the transplant team to be a poor candidate based on his poor post-op survival potential. I have not seen someone go for transplant out of hospice.

[sammyg2]

Originally Posted by jorian

Love the compassion fint. You've got me all torn up.

Compassion? Please.

Suppose there are two people waiting for the same liver and you have to make a decision on who will live and who will die.
The first is a teenage girl with some sort of hepatitis or whatever, otherwise she's healthy and a very good candidate for the operation.
The other is a drug user who admits that he is a drug user and medical science shows that his drug use would be detrimental to the odds of success of a transplant.

There are lots more people on the waiting lists then there are organs. Some people will get the organs, many more will not and will eventually die.
A person who uses illegal drugs does not belong on the first list. There's your compassion for ya.

[Jims5543]

Originally Posted by fintstone

Sounds reasonable to me. Why use a rare liver transplant on someone who is a high risk instead of someone who is not? An admitted previous intravenous drug user who was still using marijuana?

I hate to sound callous but I agree.

My uncle is in hospice right now, He is going to die soon, he has been denied a Liver even though his is shutting down. His entire life consisted of heavy drug use, he died from overdosing on two separate occasions and was revived only because the paramedics recognized his last name as the same as my dads.

He has Hepatitis C, diabetes and a host of other ailments, that preclude him from even getting on the liver transfer list.

I am sure his story could be spun in a fashion that would dictate compassion, but the bottom line is he abused the living hell out of his body for close to 50 years and it finally gave up. Now doctors are expected to save him? He couldn't be bothered to save himself.

[sammyg2]

Originally Posted by Porsche-O-Phile

I guess the only difference is that technically speeding is illegal and pot smoking under a doctor's order is legal (both in WA and CA now I believe).

Wrong. Pot is illegal everywhere in the United States. There is a federal law against it's use. I don't care what some stupidass liberal state decides, it is irrelevant.

Mush heads all over the place are pretending pot is legal because the want it to be so they can smoke it without getting in trouble, but it isn't. It is still illegal in these United States.

[gchappel]

I suspect we are only hearing one part of the story, and that marijuana use was only part of the long, and difficult decision process.
There are many more patient's in need of transplants than organs available, and thus there has to be a selection process. Some will get a transplant, and some will not. There have to be guidelines- do we give the liver to the 95 year old, or the 35 year old, etc. Pick one- there is only one liver available. I doubt if these decisions are easy or always absolutely correct, but the decision has to be made. Don't like the decisions- get involved. Otherwise, quite complaining, or at least get the whole story.
I would like to hear about the patient that got this liver. We then might even agree with the choice. As noted above, I can essentially guarantee that they did not throw a perfectly good liver away- if one was available someone else is now alive. We could only save one, not both.
As in many arguments like this, it is easy to rant and cast doubt on the system- but we do not know the details. It would be most interesting to hear from someone on one of the transplant decision teams. Without some facts, this is all noise.
I am saddened that this gentleman died, but without enough organs available, tough decisions must, and will continue, to be made.
Gary

[stomachmonkey]

My father was on a list for kidneys for years.

Offered up one of mine but considering family history dad declined insisting there was a good chance I would need both.

Dad had other health issues in addition to the kidneys so he was not very high up on the list.

He was just fine with that.

He succumbed to an aortic aneurism.

A kidney would have gone to waste.

[HardDrive]

Originally Posted by Jeff Higgins

The Seattle Times is notorious around here; I wouldn't even use it to wrap fish. Their liberal slant is unmistakable. I'm sure there is much, much more to the story that neither the reporter nor the editor felt we needed to read.

Indeed. The real story is that this fellow was not just using pot for his medical issues. He was a life long marijuana smoker, and I believe that it was 'non medical' drug use that tipped the scales here. I suspect this mans long term prospects were quite weak. Transplants are expensive, and the available organs precious.

That being said, if the panel sited his medical marijuana use in their findings, then they have a policy issue that needs to be sorted out. The conflict in policy here is caused by different groups within the medical community not seeing eye to eye. If family pratictioners want to give marijuana to patients, thats their decision. But that doesn't mean that transplant surgeons have to view it as anything other than illegal drug use.