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Prescribed pot users face transplant hurdles
by wguimb, Apr 27, 2008 04:33PM
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24327926/
Should using marijuana be held against a patient in need of transplant?
Should using marijuana be held against a patient in need of transplant?
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So glad you are here!! I know the answer to this question, but do I think its right?
Thanks for the address. I'll take a look at it.
This is another example of some one playing God sort of speak with someones life.
This guy did some things in his youth or maybe smoked a little pot so what. Lets put them in that position and ask are you going to or have you used excess amounts of sugar or caffeine? Because if you have i think we should deny you a chance at life. As we know sugar and caffeine hurts the liver far worse than any pot and i could rain down the examples .Basically it is a slippery slope when it comes to what is abuse to the liver and what is'nt. Sure there is obvious ones like alcohol or drug use but that word ,drug, applies to many legal harmfully known things to the liver. So if you used coffee with caffeine some would consider it a drug would that also keep you from a second chance at life. It amazes me these people sit on there high thrones and can make judgments like that. I would not want that on my thoughts. I say give him the liver my God..!!
Maybe he will take care of the next one with more care after suffering like he has and by the looks of it he is suffering..rahhhh!!!
D
21 hours ago
SEATTLE (AP) — A man who was denied a liver transplant largely because he used marijuana with medical approval to ease the symptoms of hepatitis C has died.
Timothy Garon, 56, died Thursday at Bailey-Boushay House, an intensive care nursing center, said his lawyer, Douglas Hiatt, and Alisha Mark, a spokeswoman for Virginia Mason Medical Center, which operates Bailey-Boushay.
His death came a week after a doctor told him a University of Washington Medical Center committee had again denied him a spot on the liver transplant list. The team had previously told him it would not consider placing him on the list until he completed a 60-day drug-treatment class.
The case highlights an ethical consideration for those allocating organs for transplant: whether using dope with a doctor's blessing should be held against a dying patient in need of a transplant.
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 the dozen states that allow it — are automatically rejected. At others, patients are given a chance to reapply if they stay clean for six months. Marijuana is illegal under federal law.
Dr. Brad Roter, who authorized Garon to smoke pot to alleviate nausea and 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.
Garon told The Associated Press last week he believed he contracted hepatitis C by sharing needles with "speed freaks" as a teenager. In recent years, he said, pot was been the only drug he used.
(This version corrects he was denied transplant largely because he used marijuana, and that doctor did not give a reason for denial.)