Organ Transplantation: Who deserves the donor kidney – Business Week

The German Medical Association has controlled German transplant centers. The result: The controls work – but there was more fraud cases than expected.

11,000 people waiting in Germany urgently for a donor organ, in order to survive. But these organs are scarce. And since, in the summer of 2012, that to multiply German transplant centers cheated and had been gemauschelt to come to its own patient quickly to an institution, the already very modest organ donation willingness continued to decline drastically. The effect:. Yet more patients die because their livers, hearts and kidneys to fail before they get a replacement fuse

Meanwhile, the regulations and control options have been drastically tightened. Your current annual report laid the Audit and Control Commission to examine the heart, kidney, pancreas and liver transplantation programs of the Federal Medical Association just before.

The result is mixed. On one hand, grab the controls that could now be carried out without concrete suspicion in 33 specialized centers. However, the examiner came across this much more manipulation and fraud cases than at the beginning of the scandal in 2012 were known. So far, the centers (Rechts der Isar) were in Göttingen, Leipzig, Münster and Munich in the spotlight, the process is ongoing. Now, the inspectors also noted rule violations in Berlin, Hamburg and Regensburg. At the German Heart Institute Berlin found themselves according to the auditor even evidence of deliberate manipulation.

That should hardly increase confidence in transplantation medicine as desired again.

In each year die in Germany 1300 people, because they vainly waiting for a donor organ. Now the government wants to control. Patients on the waiting list draw hope

But why do doctors are liable to prosecution -., And their patients formally sicker than they it really? This allows them faster at a donor organ, easily. This is illegal and can now be punishable by fines and prison, because it is against the rules of organ procurement. These rules take into account – ethically quite correct – primarily those patients who are at the longest on the waiting list and where the risk is greatest, that they die without a transplant. So shall also be prevented organs are traded -. Survive and only the highest bidders

But these rules drive dedicated physicians sometimes in a dilemma. Because from a scientific perspective the neediest patients are unfortunately usually not the ideal organ recipients. Because they are already heavily pre-damaged, a transplant them indeed may ensure the survival, but not really allow for healthy, pain-free life more. Often they even die shortly after transplantation, simply because the organ for it came too late.

health insurance information letters are sent on Organ Donation From November 1st to – because it far too few donors are. The bursts in the middle of the investigation, for the most organ donation scandal in Germany

The crucial question is therefore:. Are the selected criteria for the allocation of donor organs, right? And would such a trade-off between ethical and medical issues translate into comprehensible, objective guidelines? Would it be ethical to prefer those who benefit the most from an institution?

It would be a balancing act between need and chances of success. No doubt about it. Since, however, pending an amendment to the award guidelines by the end of the year, there is an urgent need to address this discussion openly, rather than how far prefer to sweep under the table.