Waste of a perfectly good heart

[Archimedes]

Does this put us in a slippery slope? It doesn't have to no more than the prison system put us on a slippery slope.

That's bullshit and you know it! Of course it would put us in a slippery slope if we start questioning someone's right to life.

Did you just accuse yourself of bullshit?

 

[Nice Squirrel]

Sock attack?

 

[AthenaAwakened]

Does that make the person receiving the transplant responsible for those deaths? Is the transplant system responsible for those deaths? Has the recipient or the system committed manslaughter?

No. Unlike liberal fantasyland there sometimes is no good outcome. Transplants are such a case--the demand exceeds the supply, some people will die because of this.

The system does commit manslaughter, though--we allocate organs to the sickest rather than those who will get maximum benefit from them. This means more recipients die after getting their transplant than would happen in a system that allocated based on benefit--and those deaths are attributable to the system.

In case you haven't noticed, I am not a liberal. Nor do I live in a fantasyland. And the point I am making is that this is not a moral decision on the worth of this individual over that individual because we don't like his or her lifestyle and/or we think he or she is worthy because his or her life choices are similar to ours.

Organ transplant, in order to be fair can not be a popularity contest, and like the sun shines and the rain falls on saint and sinner alike so to must the transplant process be as devoid of favoritism as possible.

 

[AthenaAwakened]

They base the taking-care-of decision based on the observed compliance while on the waiting list. I don't know compliance with what, though.

The list is the fairest way we have to allocate a scarce resource. We have to stick to the list. Future events not in our control must not sway us from that.

That's what the doctors did. A PR campaign changed this, killing someone. Your position comes close to advocating manslaughter in my book.

No, that is not what the doctors did. They corrupted the criteria of list placement and THEN said well look at the list that we decided you couldn't be on because we predict that you will do harm.

That is bullshit.

 

[dismal]

Wel, I learned a lot in this thread. We should really throw organs in the trash because people aren't harmed if they don't get them. No reason to be an organ donor at all.

I'm surprised the compassionate left was so insistent organs don't save lives but since they're right about everything it must be true.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Wel, I learned a lot in this thread. We should really throw organs in the trash because people aren't harmed if they don't get them. No reason to be an organ donor at all.

I'm surprised the compassionate left was so insistent organs don't save lives but since they're right about everything it must be true.

Organs don't save lives, people do...

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Sock attack?

Stunned. Absolutely stunned!

Ok, not really.

 

[laughing dog]

The only person we know who ended up dead from this transplant is Stokes. Mageth provided the statistic that 7% of the people on the list die before they receive a heart. Once again, you are literally making stuff up to support your position.

Just because you can't identify the dead person doesn't mean nobody died.

It means you need to come up with something other than your assumptions or inane thought experiments. If 7% of the people on the list die before they receive a transplant, that means the odds are that no one on the list died from being denied this heart. So, you need to come up with some statistics or data or actual evidence to support your claim that someone did die.

 

[Axulus]

They corrupted the criteria of list placement

Please explain how they did that.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

No. Unlike liberal fantasyland there sometimes is no good outcome. Transplants are such a case--the demand exceeds the supply, some people will die because of this.

The system does commit manslaughter, though--we allocate organs to the sickest rather than those who will get maximum benefit from them. This means more recipients die after getting their transplant than would happen in a system that allocated based on benefit--and those deaths are attributable to the system.

In case you haven't noticed, I am not a liberal. Nor do I live in a fantasyland. And the point I am making is that this is not a moral decision on the worth of this individual over that individual because we don't like his or her lifestyle and/or we think he or she is worthy because his or her life choices are similar to ours.

Organ transplant, in order to be fair can not be a popularity contest, and like the sun shines and the rain falls on saint and sinner alike so to must the transplant process be as devoid of favoritism as possible.

I'm not saying it should be a popularity contest. I'm saying it should be based on the expected benefit. Expected years of additional life * the odds of surviving the procedure.

Non-compliance causes a big hit to the expected years of life.

 

[Axulus]

Just because you can't identify the dead person doesn't mean nobody died.

It means you need to come up with something other than your assumptions or inane thought experiments. If 7% of the people on the list die before they receive a transplant, that means the odds are that no one on the list died from being denied this heart. So, you need to come up with some statistics or data or actual evidence to support your claim that someone did die.

Each year the number is 7%.

And the proper metric isn't lives saved, but expected number of years gained. Everyone dies. Giving it to the kid in the OP instead of someone else means that the expected number of years of life gained was significantly reduced.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Just because you can't identify the dead person doesn't mean nobody died.

It means you need to come up with something other than your assumptions or inane thought experiments. If 7% of the people on the list die before they receive a transplant, that means the odds are that no one on the list died from being denied this heart. So, you need to come up with some statistics or data or actual evidence to support your claim that someone did die.

No, it means you don't understand the math involved.

We have organ A. The demand is 1000/yr. The supply is 10/yr. 1% die of other causes, 980/yr die from the lack of an organ.

Organ B has a better supply. The demand is still 1000/yr but the supply is 500/yr. You still have 1% other deaths, now 490/yr die of the lack of an organ.

Note that the supply changed by 490/yr and the deaths also changed by 490/yr. It's 1:1 even though we dropped from 98% to 49%. In other words, the percentage doesn't matter.

(In practice there is the risk of the operation that will change this a bit. The basic pattern is still there, though.)

 

[laughing dog]

It means you need to come up with something other than your assumptions or inane thought experiments. If 7% of the people on the list die before they receive a transplant, that means the odds are that no one on the list died from being denied this heart. So, you need to come up with some statistics or data or actual evidence to support your claim that someone did die.

No, it means you don't understand the math involved....

I understand. You don't have any data or evidence, so you literally make stuff up to justify your assumptions about reality.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

It means you need to come up with something other than your assumptions or inane thought experiments. If 7% of the people on the list die before they receive a transplant, that means the odds are that no one on the list died from being denied this heart. So, you need to come up with some statistics or data or actual evidence to support your claim that someone did die.

No, it means you don't understand the math involved.

We have organ A. The demand is 1000/yr. The supply is 10/yr. 1% die of other causes, 980/yr die from the lack of an organ.

Organ B has a better supply. The demand is still 1000/yr but the supply is 500/yr. You still have 1% other deaths, now 490/yr die of the lack of an organ.

Note that the supply changed by 490/yr and the deaths also changed by 490/yr. It's 1:1 even though we dropped from 98% to 49%. In other words, the percentage doesn't matter.

(In practice there is the risk of the operation that will change this a bit. The basic pattern is still there, though.)

Dude, you're getting a bill from the Emergency Room for the cost of getting my brain unknoted. It has been a while since I've seen so many numbers mean just about nothing and trying to make sense of it made my brain tie itself in knots.

 

[AthenaAwakened]

It means you need to come up with something other than your assumptions or inane thought experiments. If 7% of the people on the list die before they receive a transplant, that means the odds are that no one on the list died from being denied this heart. So, you need to come up with some statistics or data or actual evidence to support your claim that someone did die.

Each year the number is 7%.

And the proper metric isn't lives saved, but expected number of years gained. Everyone dies. Giving it to the kid in the OP instead of someone else means that the expected number of years of life gained was significantly reduced.

Could you guarantee at the time of the transplant when and how the boy would die? This is life not a Hollywood movie where the state sends people to you arrest you before before you commit the crime.

 

[AthenaAwakened]

In case you haven't noticed, I am not a liberal. Nor do I live in a fantasyland. And the point I am making is that this is not a moral decision on the worth of this individual over that individual because we don't like his or her lifestyle and/or we think he or she is worthy because his or her life choices are similar to ours.

Organ transplant, in order to be fair can not be a popularity contest, and like the sun shines and the rain falls on saint and sinner alike so to must the transplant process be as devoid of favoritism as possible.

I'm not saying it should be a popularity contest. I'm saying it should be based on the expected benefit. Expected years of additional life * the odds of surviving the procedure.

Non-compliance causes a big hit to the expected years of life.

And if a panel some where decides that you or I have not enough expected benefit, does this mean the state now has the right to withhold life saving treatments from us as scarcity dictates?

 

[laughing dog]

It means you need to come up with something other than your assumptions or inane thought experiments. If 7% of the people on the list die before they receive a transplant, that means the odds are that no one on the list died from being denied this heart. So, you need to come up with some statistics or data or actual evidence to support your claim that someone did die.

Each year the number is 7%.

And the proper metric isn't lives saved, but expected number of years gained. Everyone dies. Giving it to the kid in the OP instead of someone else means that the expected number of years of life gained was significantly reduced.

That assumes that someone else did not get a heart in a timely fashion.

 

[Toni]

You are assuming that there was at least one recipient on the heart transplant list who would have been an acceptable match and could have undergone the surgery within the very limited time frame the heart was viable and that person did not get any heart.

That is not a safe assumption. Not only do organs need to be a good match histologicaly but also in terms of size. And also that any known risks in the donated organ are acceptable to the recipient and medical team. Add in a narrow time frame largely dictated by geography and it is not possible for us to know with any confidence that a better recipient missed a chance at a heart.

Yes, we are making such an assumption--because it's reality. They can fly them to other cities, the pool of recipients is large. It might not be someone at the top of the list but there will be someone.

It's not reality. The absolute truth---and I have personal knowledge, is that geography matters. There is only a very short time period in which to harvest organs, perform all of the testing, which is not just genetic testing but also includes screening for a variety of diseases which can be transmitted by transplant and/or blood donation and transporting the organs to wherever the donor is. Sometimes there is a bigger cushion of time: the donor whose family has agreed to the donation is brain dead but the body can be kept alive while testing is being performed and the best match can be found and transportation is arranged. This is the case with hearts as at this time, only 'beating hearts' are transplanted. The time frame here is still short-- hours and not days. Not every hospital is equipped and appropriately licensed to perform the appropriate testing--a brain dead person may not be at a hospital where the appropriate testing can be performed so blood samples must be collected and transported to an appropriate testing facility. These facilities are very tightly regulated. Not ever potential recipient is within the geographic distance that can be managed within the time frame.

Throw in that families can hold up the process as they come to grips with the death of their much loved family member and sometimes will challenge the donation, even if the donor has signed a card. This all takes very valuable time. It is extremely generous of families to be able to come to grips with all of the issues and agree to the donation at such a very vulnerable time, in a very short time frame.

Matches also need to be not just for tissue type but also size. A child requiring a transplant needs a small organ. A large adult requires a larger heart, not one from a child.

It's not as simple as we'd like to think.

 

[coloradoatheist]

Unfortunately we can only make an educated guess. Somebody with medical knowledge would need to know the heart type he needed, blood type, etc and how many people on the waiting list were looking for that type of heart.

 

[dismal]

Unfortunately we can only make an educated guess. Somebody with medical knowledge would need to know the heart type he needed, blood type, etc and how many people on the waiting list were looking for that type of heart.

Well, ok but until then compassionate people must vehemently deny that additional organs save lives.