Man denied new liver because he used Medical Marijuana

[NaptownKnight]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080426/...na_transplants

Medical marijuana patients face transplant hurdles

By GENE JOHNSON, Associated Press Writer

Timothy Garon's face and arms are hauntingly skeletal, but the fluid building up in his abdomen makes the 56-year-old musician look eight months pregnant. His liver, ravaged by hepatitis C, is failing. Without a new one, his doctors tell him, he will be dead in days. But Garon's been refused a spot on the transplant list, largely because he has used marijuana, even though it was legally approved for medical reasons.
"I'm not angry, I'm not mad, I'm just confused," said Garon, lying in his hospital bed a few minutes after a doctor told him the hospital transplant committee's decision Thursday.
With the scarcity of donated organs, transplant committees like the one at the University of Washington Medical Center use tough standards, including whether the candidate has other serious health problems or is likely to drink or do drugs.
And with cases like Garon's, they also have to consider — as a dozen states now have medical marijuana laws — if using dope with a doctor's blessing should be held against a dying patient in need of a transplant.
Most transplant centers struggle with the how to deal with people who have used marijuana, said Dr. Robert Sade, director of the Institute of Human Values in Health Care at the Medical University of South Carolina.
"Marijuana, unlike alcohol, has no direct effect on the liver. It is however a concern ... in that it's a potential indicator of an addictive personality," Sade said.
The Virginia-based United Network for Organ Sharing, which oversees the nation's transplant system, leaves it to individual hospitals to develop criteria for transplant candidates.
At some, people who use "illicit substances" — including medical marijuana, even in states that allow it — are automatically rejected. At others, such as the UCLA Medical Center, patients are given a chance to reapply if they stay clean for six months. Marijuana is illegal under federal law.
Garon believes he got hepatitis by sharing needles with "speed freaks" as a teenager. In recent years, he said, pot has been the only drug he's used. In December, he was arrested for growing marijuana.
Garon, who has been hospitalized or in hospice care for two months straight, said he turned to the university hospital after Seattle's Harborview Medical Center told him he needed six months of abstinence.
The university also denied him, but said it would reconsider if he enrolled in a 60-day drug-treatment program. This week, at the urging of Garon's lawyer, the university's transplant team reconsidered anyway, but it stuck to its decision.
Dr. Brad Roter, the Seattle physician who authorized Garon's pot use for nausea, abdominal pain and to stimulate his appetite, said he did not know it would be such a hurdle if Garon were to need a transplant.
That's typically the case, said Peggy Stewart, a clinical social worker on the liver transplant team at UCLA who has researched the issue. "There needs to be some kind of national eligibility criteria," she said.
The patients "are trusting their physician to do the right thing. The physician prescribes marijuana, they take the marijuana, and they are shocked that this is now the end result," she said.
No one tracks how many patients are denied transplants over medical marijuana use.
Pro-marijuana groups have cited a handful of cases, including at least two patient deaths, in Oregon and California, since the mid-to-late 1990s, when states began adopting medical marijuana laws.
Many doctors agree that using marijuana — smoking it, especially — is out of the question post-transplant.
The drugs patients take to help their bodies accept a new organ increase the risk of aspergillosis, a frequently fatal infection caused by a common mold found in marijuana and tobacco.
But there's little information on whether using marijuana is a problem before the transplant, said Dr. Emily Blumberg, an infectious disease specialist who works with transplant patients at the University of Pennsylvania Hospital.
Further complicating matters, Blumberg said, is that some insurers require proof of abstinence, such as drug tests, before they'll agree to pay for transplants.
Dr. Jorge Reyes, a liver transplant surgeon at the UW Medical Center, said that while medical marijuana use isn't in itself a sign of substance abuse, it must be evaluated in the context of each patient.
"The concern is that patients who have been using it will not be able to stop," Reyes said.
Dale Gieringer, state coordinator for the California chapter of NORML, the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, scoffed at that notion.
"Everyone agrees that marijuana is the least habit-forming of all the recreational drugs, including alcohol," Gieringer said. "And unlike a lot of prescription medications, it's nontoxic to the liver."
Reyes and other UW officials declined to discuss Garon's case.
But Reyes said that in addition to medical concerns, transplant committees — which often include surgeons, social workers, and nutritionists — must evaluate whether patients have the support and psychiatric health to cope with a complex post-operative regimen for the rest of their lives.
Garon, the lead singer for Nearly Dan, a Steely Dan cover-band, remains charged with manufacturing weed. He insists he was following the state law, which limits patients to a "60-day supply" but doesn't define that amount.
"He's just a fantastic musician, and he's a great guy," said his girlfriend, Liesa Bueno. "I wish there was something we could do legally. ... I'm going to miss him terribly if he passes."

I feel that this county's marijuana laws need to change. The "drug" isn't even that harmful, and the cost of prosecuting marijuana offenders is growing larger by the minute. This is because not only does a marijuana offender's case cost money to prosecute, marijuana offenders are taking up spaces in our jails, forcing us to build more for real criminals. And then there are cases like these. Words can't describe how horrible that decision was by that hospital's committee.




Opinions?

[Каие]

Absolutely ludicrous he was refused for that, when his case was so severe, probably religious....but if its medicinal isn't that not against the law anyway? So no law change is required.

[Axeman]

While I can't stand the idea of this, I know where they are comming from. These doctors essentialy have to decide who's life is more worth the others due to the scarcity of donated organs, so hey have to do something to slim down those eligable so they can justify giving it to less people rather then picking people at random from the list *excluding its order based on severity* then they could be in for a big lawsuit.

[Shaun]

Yeah, Americas' prisons need to be filled with people who do pot rather than rapists. Yeah, people who have taken their medicine do not deserve new livers. The cheek he has!

[Carach]

Yeah, Americas' prisons need to be filled with people who do pot rather than rapists. Yeah, people who have taken their medicine do not deserve new livers. The cheek he has!

as shaun says.

This is insane. a guy given the stuff for medical reasons is now denied a lifesaving operation for it.

Talk about a stab in the back..

[NakedBarbarian2]

Yeah, Americas' prisons need to be filled with people who do pot rather than rapists. Yeah, people who have taken their medicine do not deserve new livers. The cheek he has!

I would have though america's prisons would be full of potential donars? You guys could just chuck a china, when you execute some guy just divy him up and forcibly donate his organs. Problem solved.

On the whole marijuanna thing, people should just get a ing life. smoking nugz is fun, its not like ing up your body with heroin or drinking and getting pissed everyday, guess its coz the government makes money off of booze

EDIT: Besides which, if forced to take a lie detector test, how many young or middle-aged people can honestly say that they haven't smoked marijuanna anyways? The only thing pot should affect is if people want to donate their brains lol

[Gelgoog]

I would have though america's prisons would be full of potential donars? You guys could just chuck a china, when you execute some guy just divy him up and forcibly donate his organs. Problem solved.

On the whole marijuanna thing, people should just get a ing life. smoking nugz is fun, its not like ing up your body with heroin or drinking and getting pissed everyday, guess its coz the government makes money off of booze

EDIT: Besides which, if forced to take a lie detector test, how many young or middle-aged people can honestly say that they haven't smoked marijuanna anyways? The only thing pot should affect is if people want to donate their brains lol

uhg not another legalize it thread

[Gelgoog]

physicians deny transpants all the time to people for issues such as drinking and smoking.

[Marie Louise von Preussen]

"Medical" Marijuana?

WTH?

[Marie Louise von Preussen]

I would have though america's prisons would be full of potential donars? You guys could just chuck a china, when you execute some guy just divy him up and forcibly donate his organs. Problem solved.

That would only work if the death penalty is instituted for a multitude of crimes. Stealing cabbages being one of them.

In other words, not viable unless the US turns into a totalitarian hole.

[Rhinosaur]

Opinions?

Dude had it coming. WE all know what weed does to your liver after prolonged exposure.

[Lawrence of Arabia]

Do you guys think livers grow on trees for everyone to have? No. There are people all over the United States that could use a liver that haven't smoked marijuana.

Also, I didn't read the article (sorry), but did the guy have a copy of a prescription of it? I'd think if he did that it would be more likely for him to obtain a liver.

[Rhinosaur]

Do you guys think livers grow on trees for everyone to have? No. There are people all over the United States that could use a liver that haven't smoked marijuana.

Guess what shouldn't be a factor in whether the guy gets a liver transplant: that's right, the weed smoking. How many people do you think use currently or have used marijuana for recreation in the USA? It's a lot. A whole lot.

[Lawrence of Arabia]

Guess what shouldn't be a factor in whether the guy gets a liver transplant: that's right, the weed smoking. How many people do you think use currently or have used marijuana for recreation in the USA? It's a lot. A whole lot.

How many users of marijuana need organ donors?

I could understand the reason for using marijuana was to fight the nausea that comes along with chemotherapy used for, say, liver cancer. However, it is not clearly explained in the article.

[Rhinosaur]

How many users of marijuana need organ donors?

Does it matter? If the pot use didn't cause him to need an organ, than they are morally wrong for denying him the organ if he was next on the list.

[Lawrence of Arabia]

Does it matter? If the pot use didn't cause him to need an organ, than they are morally wrong for denying him the organ if he was next on the list.

Well, marijuana does contain THC. If they could give a liver to someone who hasn't used marijuana outside of the regulations of the law.

Again, if the guy had a prescription for marijuana, I don't think there should be a problem. However, buying marijuana on your own and then having a doctor say "Yeah, you could classify that as being for medicinal use" shouldn't be the same.

But Garon's been refused a spot on the transplant list, largely because he has used marijuana, even though it was legally approved for medical reasons.

I am not sure which one it is in this case.

[danzig]

Flat out wrong to deny him. I can maybe see the reasoning if he was a pot user before his illness because you would want the organs given how few they are to go to the best prospects. Just like imo a child should get preference over say a 60 yr old if all other factors are equal. But denying him because he was using the stuff for pain and under direction from his doctor is pretty damn stupid.