Posted on 07/05/2007 11:34:16 AM PDT by Bronco_Buster_FweetHyagh
The mother of a San Luis Obispo man who died after an attempted organ donation at Sierra Vista Regional Medical Center last year claims she never gave hospital officials consent to take her son off life-support and was misinformed when agreeing to the organ harvest, according to a wrongful death lawsuit.
Rosa Navarro also alleges in her June 29 civil lawsuit that a transplant surgeon misrepresented himself as her son’s doctor, an allegation the surgeon’s attorney strongly denies. She also said she agreed to the organ donation only because she believed her son had no chance of survival.
Defendants in the lawsuit — the San Luis Obispo hospital; its parent company, Dallas-based Tenet Corp.; the California Transplant Donor Network; transplant physicians Hootan Roozrokh and Arturo Martinez; and their employer, The Permanente Medical Group Inc.—are accused of assault, battery, fraud, civil conspiracy, negligence, medical malpractice and intentional infliction of emotional distress.
Sierra Vista hospital on Tuesday denied any wrongdoing in the Feb. 4, 2006, death of 25-year-old Ruben Navarro.
Rosa Navarro, 54, is asking for unlimited compensation in the death of her son.
Ruben Navarro, who was dying of a rare metabolic disorder, had been on life support for four days and was expected to die. His mother agreed to donate his organs, and the California Transplant Donor Network dispatched its transplant team to Sierra Vista.
Rosa Navarro said during an interview from her Oxnard home Tuesday that when she arrived at the hospital she asked about her son’s condition. She said a hospital nurse told her to speak with the doctor.
“He came over and approached me and said I’m in charge of Ruben,” Navarro said of Roozrokh, who was part of the surgical team from San Francisco dispatched by Oakland-based Organ Transplant Donor Network.
“I asked him, ‘Doctor could you do anything for my boy?’ and he said, ‘Oh, no. Oh no… There’s nothing I can do for a patient like him.’ ”
Navarro said through sobs that Roozrokh asked her if she planned to watch him disconnect her son from life-support.
“He didn’t even ask me, ‘What do you want me to do Ms. Navarro? Do you want me to keep him on the machine or whatever?’ ” Navarro said.
Roozrokh’s attorney, M. Gerry Schwartzbach, told The Tribune on Tuesday that his client never spoke with Rosa Navarro and was not in charge of her son’s medical care.
“He did not have any conversation with her with regard to taking Ruben off the respirator. … Dr. Roozrokh was in the Bay Area,” Schwartzbach said. “I feel very bad for Ms. Navarro because she’s going through a great deal, but unfortunately someone misled her because she never met (Roozrokh) and she never spoke to him. That is absolutely clear.”
Schwartzbach said a local physician made the decision to remove Ruben Navarro from life support.
Ruben Navarro was brought into the operating room at 11 p.m. Feb. 3, 2006, and his breathing tube was removed. But he did not die within 30 minutes—the window during which organs could be harvested. He died nine hours later, according to the lawsuit.
An operating-room nurse reported that standard medical procedures weren’t followed when Navarro was taken off life support.
The lawsuit alleges Roozrokh ordered Ruben Navarro be given lethal doses of morphine and Ativan, an accusation also reported as a finding in a federal investigation by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
The report showed an intensive care nurse gave Ruben Navarro 220 milligrams of morphine and 80 milligrams of Ativan.
Sierra Vista spokesman Ron Yukelson did not respond to specific allegations against the hospital.
He did say a surgeon contracted with the donor network assumed responsibility for Navarro in violation of hospital policy, which requires a doctor to be credentialed by the hospital to treat a living patient.
District attorney’s investigators have been reviewing the case since March, but have made no decision about filing criminal charges.
“It’s a very unique case. No one’s prosecuted a case like this anywhere,” Assistant District Attorney Dan Hilford said Tuesday. “The case is very complex and deals with issues that require a great deal of research and study.”
State Medical Board spokeswoman Candis Cohen said the agency is investigating Roozrokh.
Martinez, the other doctor on the transplant team, could not be reached for comment.
What does "ground zero" mean to you? And how do you know "different"?
Try reading, with an open mind, some people who might just "know different" from you:
The Real Myths of Organ Donation
THE HEART-STOPPING TRUTH ABOUT ORGAN DONATION
What is ‘brain death’? A British physician’s view
Forbes Magazine: Desperate Arrangements - "The demand for transplants can't be met by altruistic organ banks, so Internet brokers are stepping into the breach. It's not a pretty picture."
Washington Post: Organ Demand Forces Dilemmas - "Preemptive and invasive organ preservation without family consent is just one of several increasingly aggressive organ procurement strategies coming into use in this country... [Washington D.C. law already permits "organ harvesting" without consent]"
I would have felt funny about being compensated, and I think that type of element would cause more problems with the decision making process for the families.
add $$ into the picture and then it isn’t about trying to figure out what the patient would have wanted -
On a biography page Roozrokh lists Farsi as other languages spoken. Now just where do they speak that?
http://www.permanente.net/homepage/kaiser/doctor/hootanroozrokh/
“””””I have nothing against organ donation , it saves and improves lives...””””
Does it? What about the donors’ lives - is it possible their lives would be saved if there was less emphasis on their by-products?
The brain dead? More research on brain resuscitation? More research on comatose parameters?
Just asking.
“The brain dead? More research on brain resuscitation? More research on comatose parameters?”
excellent questions - and these are questions I asked of the doctors and our family member who works in this area.
It is also why I found the Schiavo case so compelling, because if my daughter had exhibited JUST ONE SIGN of brain activity - we would have made a different decision.
“”””Ruben Navarro, who was dying of a rare metabolic disorder, had been on life support for four days and was expected to die.”””
Question: How viable could Ruben’s liver/spleen/pancreas been if he was dying from a rare, incurable(?) metabolic disorder?
Why was he not eligible to get a transplant?
See what I mean? - this is just too inequitable/unethical.
I work in a hospital setting dealing with patients who are sometimes pronounced brain dead due to trauma. In my facility nobody gets different treatment because they have or have not signed a donor card or whether they do or do not have insurance. Nothing is done without family consent and families are not pressured. Flow studies are done on the brain at different intervals to diagnose brain death. I’m sure there are abuses within the system, but they aren’t the norm and I’ve never seen anything that raised my ethical eyebrows. There is so much oversight and review by different parties it would be very difficult for graft to occur. The people involved in the process are caring, well trained, and ethical. They are involved because they are committed to saving lives, but not at the expense of murdering an ill or injured patient. The harvest team doesn’t come from within the hospital. They have no contact with the donor or the donor’s family. I will look at your links with an open mind, but ask you have an open mind too. The picture being painted on this thread of money grubbers butchering patients to line their pockets is ludicrous. This is not something done lightly — our whole facility is saddened when a life is lost and dollar signs are far from anybody’s mind.
Find for the Plaintiff. This happens all too often. The profits in the transplant biz are astronomical and more than likely, put on a second set of books.
Of course. Scum they are.
Tom Selleck was a victim/character in the movie Coma. I have the book written as a sci-fi novel.
You can donate any money to a charity if you wish... obviously in the case of a minor the parents or guardian would be in control of any decision... as you have a cardiac surgeon in the family I’m going to assume that you have no money problems of consequence... My father died in the last year leaving my mother on a poor financial footing despite a pension (cut in half at his death) and SS and a small insurance policy,, he was a success , a salesman for IBM who made more than quota in most years (beginning in the glory years of the early 1960’s) but was unable to save due to medical bills related to my younger sister (20% of insane and inflated medical surgical bills are enough to destroy any savings), I don’t know what organs (if any) of his were used to treat others ,, I know he was an organ donor, it would have been nice to let his gift(s) assist my mother. I don’t have all the answers but it appears that in 10-20 years we will be able to salvage failing organs with adult stem cell treatments... I can see very clearly your ethical concerns when it comes to end-of-life donations ,,, I would like to see the rules discarded for blood donations and other living donor donations.
“””I work in a hospital setting....”
Beautifully written and comforting to those who support organ transplantation.
I do not share the philosophy that organ harvesting & replanting is “a life well lived”, for the donor or recipient.
So, fine, don’t offer to donate yours, and do not accept a transplanted organ. I completely disagree with your philosophy, or fears, or whatever the source of your objections are - in fact your objections completely baffles me. I will continue to be prepared to have my organs harvested if at some point I can no longer make use of them, if it can help someone else.
The harvest team doesn’t come from within the hospital. They have no contact with the donor or the donor’s family.Read the story. The "harvest team" was INTRODUCED to the family by the hospital. My gas-passer friend tells me that the glee in the butchers voice as they dismember the living body and talk about the monetary value of the organs is real and constant.
I can’t imagine making that decision, but at least you had someone there who could help you through it.
My father in law is a physician and I have made it very clear to him and in my living will under what circumstances to terminate life support.
Hopefully they can bring capital murder charges against him.
“as you have a cardiac surgeon in the family I’m going to assume that you have no money problems of consequence...”
I wish!! :)
His earnings are his own.
we’re doing better now though...at that point in our lives we could have used some extra money...but who doesn’t?
I still would have felt funny about receiving it though.
I think you are right about the adult stem cells though - it is amazing what they’ve come up with in a short amount of time.
The autopsy confirmed my daughter’s injury was to the brain stem, and so far there is no recovering from that type of injury - or from brain death.
It would be nice though to read someday, that a family in our position could be told that their child will receive adult stem cell treatment, and this would reverse the damage.
How fantastic would that be?
“My father in law is a physician and I have made it very clear to him and in my living will under what circumstances to terminate life support.”
By “life support” do you mean the ventilator?
Even if we hadn’t gone the route of donation - we had no legal means of fighting a disconnection.
Once brain death was declared, the doctors had the legal righ to turn off the ventilator.
“””So, fine, don’t offer to donate yours,”””
Self-righteous pomposity is so unbecoming!
I am fine with termination ONCE I am legitimately brain dead.
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