Sad Story- Mexican girl KILLED by Duke University

You guys see what happened to that Mexican teen who was in care at Duke University Medical Center. She died today. :cry:


Can you believe the do a heart/lung transplant with the wrong blood type. 2 weeks later they find some new organs and do another heart'lung transplant. By then the damage was already done that the new transplant was too late.


I can't believe something like this could happen at a major medical institution.

My condolences to her family.

>>>Teenager Who Got Botched Transplant Dies


By Emery P. DALESIO
The Associated Press
Saturday, February 22, 2003; 5:35 PM


Jesica Santillan, the teenager who survived a botched heart-lung transplant long enough to get an odds-shattering second set of donated organs, died Saturday afternoon.

Jesica was declared brain dead at 1:25 p.m., and taken off life-support machines at about 5 p.m., said Duke University Medical Center spokesman Richard Puff.

Earlier Saturday, a lawyer for the 17-year-old's family said they would not agree to remove her from life-support until they were allowed to get an outside doctor's opinion on her condition. Puff said he did not know if the hospital had the Santillans' consent to turn off the machines.

He said the family declined to donate any organs from Jesica's body, including the heart and lungs that had been donated to her in an operation Thursday. He did not know if those organs had been in any condition to use in a second transplant.
© 2003 The Associated Press<<<

it is pretty damn sad. instead of two sets of organs being used to save two lives they were used to kill one....
what a waste of good intention.

I have good friends who work for the organ procurement agency involved here. It is a tragic mistake and there shouldn't be any excuses made (from what I've seen, those involved have taken responsibility and not tried to dodge it). Its not been clear to me where the ball got dropped, but it might help explain the error to know that heart/lung donation can only come from a living (but brain dead) donor who must be kept 'alive' artificially via ventilator and a large number of vasoactive IV drugs. The donors in these cases are extremely unstable and just maintaining a blood pressure is a challenge. The point being that as soon as brain death is confirmed, the clock is ticking on the donor's organ viability, and there is extreme time pressure to find a match and get the donor and recipient into a suitable operating room with donor surgeons. Very sad case, and again not making any excuses. Patient's on heart transplant lists are living day to day anyway and are extremely unstable. So there is no reserve for additional stress, particularly not something as major as transplanting incompatible organs.

I dislike Duke hoops and all but to say the University Killed her is insane. Their medical center and more specifically, staff who were involved in this operation dropped the ball, should be asked to leave the school for not following manditory rules about double checking that stuff.

I'd imagine their whole medical center is going to take a hit finacially and even more.....their Rep is dropping because 1. This happened and 2. Recent reports say that some of their staff didn't react fast enough trying to save face.

So, Coach K didn't do this. Their Dean didn't do it. You could say she was killed by Duke Medical and that would still be pushing it.

While I feel for the family, I think it would be more fitting to say that she died while Duke tried to save her life. The topic heading sounds like that did this purposely . This was a young woman who had little chance to survive prior to having any surgery. A greves mistake had been made, and the doctors did everything to save her. People make mistakes, and systems sometimes fail causing these tragedies that happen from time to time. This one just happened to get more media coverage then others.

this does lend perspective to the trial lawyer thread from several weeks ago....I seem to recall Art's points about precisely something like this...........unfortunately....someone (and their years of training) is going to have to be held accountable.....

I think it will be a group that take the fall. From what I caught on the news this morning, the labeling of blood type is done on the doner end, and then the organ(s) are shipped to where they are needed. If in fact it was mislabeled at the start, Is the person on the doner end libel or the tec at duke that didn't reconfirm by type matching again. Gonna get messey one way or the other. I would think the most money is to made from suit against Duke first, and the trickel down the line if the family chooses to sue. I'm guessing there will be a very rich Mexican family in the near future. All the money doesn't bring loved ones back.

Before the 1st operation, her chances were 50/50 they said. Before the 2nd operation, I'm sure it dropped to under 10%.

This is a tragedy.

It would also be a tragedy if lawsuits or rediculously-high insurance premiums made places like Duke pull away from doing this kind of work.

John Edwards is salivating.

A tragedy. And one that exposes alot of problems with our medical systems as well as immigration. SHe was an illegal alien so not only did they kill her, they kept two American citizens from having the opportunity to live. It was heartening to see the community rally to raise the funds to get her the first surgery, but the botched job will end up costing the taxpayers millions fromt he second surgery and certain lawsuits.

nice spin

Truth hurts sometimes.

I don't know which is worse, the wording that perhaps implies this tragedy was a deliberate act, or immediately trying to score political points from it (ironically, by claiming the OTHER guy will use this to score points). To insinuate that somebody is pleased by all this is a disgrace, and attributing that to one's own distorted version of 'truth' is no excuse.

Perhaps I am missing something her - how again was she an illegal alien?

Did she cross the border illegally?

From everything I have read, she was brought to the US to save her life - with the backing of the US government.