Nov 17, 2008 4:00 pm US/Central
Woman Sues After Organ Transplant Led To HIV
CHICAGO (STNG) ―
A 33-year-old woman who tested positive for HIV and hepatitis c after receiving an infected kidney during an organ transplant at the University of Chicago Medical Center sued the hospital and a surgeon on the transplant team Monday.
The woman identified as Jane Doe in the suit was one of four people who received infected organs from the single male donor at Chicago-area hospitals in January 2007, said Thomas Demetrio, the woman's attorney. All four were diagnosed with HIV and hepatitis c after the transplants, Demetrio said.
"Emotionally she's pretty devastated, to be honest," he said. "She's just coping with the hand that's been dealt her."
The suit claims Dr. J. Richard Thistlewaite and others in the hospital's transplant team were told by Gift of Hope Organ and Tissue Donor Network that the donor was a homosexual who died in a car collision. The transplant team never told the recipient, whose condition was non-life threatening, the donor was homosexual, which the suit claims is considered "high risk" for organ donation.
A spokesman for the hospital did not have an immediate comment.
Demetrio said the Center for Disease Control's guidelines state that unless the case is life or death, the recipient must be told the background if the donor is a gay man.
Jane Doe previously rejected two kidneys, one from a heavy drinker who had encounters with prostitutes and another who was out on parole for an unknown offense, he said. Had she known the donor was a homosexual, she would have declined the kidney, Demetrio said.
The Center for Disease Control's guidelines for organ donation defines high-risk donor behavior as male-to-male sexual contact, acquisition of sexually transmitted diseases, exchange of sex for money or drugs, injecting-drug use or a birth mother infected or at risk for HIV.
Jane Doe was one of four people infected in January 2007 with HIV and hepatitis c from the donor, who gave both kidneys, his heart and liver. One has since died, Demetrio said.
Jane Doe's body rejected the kidney and she is currently on dialysis in addition to receiving treatment for HIV, he said.
The January 2007 Chicago-area transplants were the first time since 1994 that HIV was contracted through a donated organ.
Two blood tests on the donor showed no signs of antibodies for HIV or hepatitis c, the Sun-Times reported in November 2007, when the infections were first publicly revealed. Officials said at the time that there were limitations to the standard tests used to screen organs for the antibodies.
(Source: Sun-Times News Group Wire © Chicago Sun-Times 2009. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
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