[Nathans_Dad]

I'm not here to tell anyone what to believe, but I have a patient in the hospital who will likely die because he is a JW and refuses to accept blood products. He came in for an elective surgery and got pneumonia post-operatively. He went onto the ventilator and we have been able to get him off the vent, fever down, etc. He is in kidney failure and will need dialysis soon. The only problem is that his hemoglobin today is 5.5 (normal is 14). That means he has lost about at least 6-7 units of blood since all this started. We are trying everything to get him to make his own red cells but he is just too sick. The family is ok with dialysis, but if we start dialysis his anemia will get much worse because some blood always stays in the machine after you finish dialysis...


He did not donate any blood prior to his operation either so we are stuck. It's just frustrating to go all this way and he will end up dying from something that is completely reversible...