Woman who was denied a liver transplant, after review highlighted alcohol use, has died

I've known entirely too many alcoholics that have had too many wake-up and come-to-Jesus moments, only to go back to drinking as soon as the immediate crisis is over. Change only comes when the alcoholic wants to change for their own reasons, not due to external factors.

Livers are a limited resource. Wasting a donor's liver on a person that us is unlikely to stop drinking--despite their protestations--means that another person doesn't get one. It may seem like a cruel calculus, but it's the only reasonable way to ration a scarce resource. It doesn't matter if alcoholism is a disease, or you think that it's a moral failing; the end result is the same.

As an alcoholic, I initially agreed. Don't waste a liver on me. Then this:

Even pleas for a living liver transplant, with Allan offering to be her donor, were not entertained.

What the actual fuck.

Jesus Christ that’s fucked up. Only 36 too and stopped drinking… and had a willing living donor. What do you do in this situation when they won’t help you? Go down to Mexico?

Since no one has mentioned it, USA has the same policy basically.

Hi, transplanted organ recipient here (heart in my case), please be an organ donor if possible, thanks.

There are more people who need transplants than there are organs, so the medical profession has to make decisions about who to deny. This was a reasonable decision, in my opinion.

I'm quite torn on this issue, my sister donated her kidneys and liver when she died. On one hand people who need an organ, need an organ but on the other hand deceased persons organs are so rare that they should go to those with liver diseases they have no medical control over before those who are sick from an avoidable disorder.

I don't like to think of my sister's liver going to someone who would abuse it over someone who just happen to have a genetic liver issue. She lived a life too short bringing joy and education to many children, her final act saving others would be soured by someone wasting it.

Maybe if donating organs was compulsory they wouldn't be so rare.

As grim as it might be, transplants are handled by apathetic, risk averse math and little else. Loose organs and surgeons are far from common.

My cousin was a raging alcoholic. He got clean, but not before he fucked his liver right up. I don't know if they even allowed him on the liver transplant list or not, but if he was, he was very low on it. He died in early 2015 at the age of 43.

Well this was informative. I will now start lying to my doctor about my occasional alcohol use.

I donated a kidney to a friend earlier this year. The reason his kidneys failed wasn't anything he was at fault for, but even if it had been because of poor decisions he'd made in the past, I still would have given him one of mine. Because people deserve second chances. I can understand not wanting to give a recovering alcoholic a deceased donor's liver, when someone else could receive that liver, instead. But this woman's partner was a match and was willing to donate to her. What's the harm in that? That isn't a liver that could have gone to someone else who needed it. It's a donation that would have either gone to her or no one else. No one could have lost out of the donation had been carried out. This was just cruelty, and now someone is dead. And for what? Because there's a 15% chance (according to studies the article mentioned) that she might have started drinking again???

Giving a donor liver to an alcoholic, who only quit drinking upon diagnosis? Hell no. There are people with 5+ years who still worry about relapsing. A year is a start. Being forced to quit? I'd have wished her good luck if they gave the liver, but the person who dies instead of her?

I've watched alcoholics die of liver failure. It is a horribly sad thing. But sobriety is a choice, and you don't get to go back in time to make it. I'm not sure why this article is spinning this as cruelty from the transplant board instead of maybe, just maybe, highlighting the destructive role that alcohol plays in society. I wonder if a booze company pays their bills or something.

It's incredibly sad to hear someone die of a preventable cause this young, but I can also somewhat relate with the people who reviewed her application.

If a living donor wouldn't have been sufficient, they've now created two patients where they previously had one, and without improving the primary patient's condition. It makes sense that a donor organ from a deceased donor would be preferable.

That said, the current requirement for the patient to meet deceased donor standards for transplantation to be eligible to use a willing living donor make no sense. Both situations should have their own unique criteria, given that a living donor situation involves different risks for both the patient and the donor than a deceased donor situation would incur.

Ultimately this whole situation boils down to a scarcity situation though. If we want to solve this, it will require more people to register themselves as a donor and a review of the eligibility criteria as soon as more donors are available.

How has Polievre not tried to capitalize on this tragedy to pitch his "your bank is a better death panel than the transplant math" plan yet? American healthcare is half his platform!

The provincial governments in charge of our single payor health care system made the conscious decision to keep the liquor marts open while banning in-person sales of tea kettles (and we call ourselves a commonwealth nation!) during a pandemic.

I think our single payor at least partially did this to themselves.

If you are going to make alcohol consumption a bar to a liver transplant without making alcohol illegal you should all go fuck yourselves. You had a drink and you should die should not be a thing.

How come we've managed to make artificial heart but not artificial kidney or liver?

Somehow I read the article thinkingshe had a kidney problem which we have two of.

How can her boyfriend even donate his liver? Wouldn't he die?

Using the most recent data from the Canadian Institute for Health Information on hospital bed costs (2016), Huska’s time at the Oakville hospital likely cost over $450,000 - ($3,592 per day for ICU care) with an additional 61 days in a ward bed which likely cost about $1,200 a day A liver transplant in Ontario is pegged at about $71,000 to $100,000 in Ontario based on data from 2019.

I've come to the realization the only ones getting us off the dark timeline is us. I'm in USA, ready and willing. Thinking through what beginning steps I can take.

Using the most recent data from the Canadian Institute for Health Information on hospital bed costs (2016), Huska’s time at the Oakville hospital likely cost over $450,000 - ($3,592 per day for ICU care) with an additional 61 days in a ward bed which likely cost about $1,200 a day

A liver transplant in Ontario is pegged at about $71,000 to $100,000 in Ontario based on data from 2019. "It's a shame that so much money was spent keeping her alive under such horrendous circumstances and putting her family and her partner under such stress when the remedy was a lot cheaper and could have happened much, much sooner," said Selkirk.

The survival rate of patients with alcohol-related liver disease who receive a deceased donor liver transplant has steadily improved to reach 80–85 per cent at one year after a transplant.

Can anyone make this add up?

@NightOwl brutal

I thought this was about kidneys instead of livers and was very confused.

Selkirk said she and Allan are both discussing a legal challenge to the liver transplant guidelines for those with alcohol use disorder “with people who have their own living donor.” “It's not fair and it's not right, and hopefully we'll change that policy,” Selkirk said.

Even if her partner could donate his own liver, it should still go to a better recipient. If anything he should be donating anyways to honor her and save a life

womp womp, its their fault that she denied the liver