Organ Transplants Go Wrong

Organ transplants procedures at the Austin and Royal Melbourne hospitals have claimed 3 casualties within a week as the organs had come from a donor who had had hepatitis B. It is suspected that the three women, Gurpal Sandhu, 64, Carmellina Sirianni, 63, and Karen Wilkinson, 43 - had died from arenavirus, a rare and recently detected rodent disease that has never infected other transplant patients. The donor, Jovo Vranjesevic, was a 57 year old man from Serbia, and his surgeon, Michael Fink has disclaimed all responsibility in determining whether the organs could be used for transplants. He stated that there were powerful antibiotics to deal the risk of hepatitis B or C or HIV. He also seem to justify what had taken place because of the five to seven-year waiting for kidney transplants. Ms. Wilkinson’s partner, though, said had the patient known of the donor’s medical history, she would have probably not carried on with the procedure. Coroner Audrey Jamieson is examining the screening process for donors and recipients, informed consent of recipients, whether there was any opportunity to learn earlier of the deteriorating condition of the three women before they died and if that would have changed the outcomes, and the capacity to now screen for arenavirus. Jamieson mentioned, at court, the need for Victorians to have confidence in the state’s donor transplant system. Source-Medindia