4 ms·

My ex-wife is still recovering from her second liver transplant. The first one was when she was 20, due to a genetic disease that causes sudden liver failure ar

My ex-wife is still recovering from her second liver transplant. The first one was when she was 20, due to a genetic disease that causes sudden liver failure around that age. That time, she went from ER to transplant to recovery in just a few days, because of how quickly she became sick enough to move to the top of the list. They never told her that liver transplants are pretty much always temporary, at least with the immuno-suppressant drugs that were available most of the past 20ish years. Even with drugs, most people's bodies are constantly attacking the foreign liver and damaging it beyond its ability to repair itself. 20 years is a pretty good run; hers lasted 22. This time around, she was in the hospital for two months (seemed much longer) while they tried to keep her alive. She went through all the symptoms you mentioned. Towards the end she suffered full-on dementia from the toxins in her brain. After two months of suffering, she lost her will to live, and told me and her family that she was giving up. I was sure she'd be gone by the end of the week, but that night the miracle happened; a compatible liver was available and she was at the top of the list. The next day, after a very long surgery (working around 22 years of scar tissue from the first transplant) she got a healthy new liver. She remained in the hospital two more months, mostly in rehab, while her brain returned to normal (mostly) and she learned to walk again. It took months after going home for her to be strong enough to fully care for herself. Unfortunately, the decades of drugs and months of liver failure pushed her kidneys past their limit. She's not on dialysis yet, but most likely she will need a transplant before the year is up. It's just a matter of time, and she's trying to find a living donor. If she can find one, she can get the transplant before she gets too sick again, which will make recovery much easier. Organ transplants are absolute miracles of modern medicine, but we need artificial organs. Whether they're completely mechanical, natural organs grown artificially, or custom gene-spliced organs to prevent rejection, we need them. There aren't enough organs available now to meet the need, and the patients who get them have to go through hell first. And the ones who don't, don't survive at all.

klipt 9y ago
> we need artificial organs Or a way to farm organs in the lab. If self driving cars succeed in massively reducing accident deaths (yay!) an unintended consequence will be huge shortfalls in donatable organs.
- Teever 9y ago
  All the more reason to make organ donation opt out or mandatory.
  - kafkaesq 9y ago
    You know, at some point negative tradeoffs kick in when you try to go do far with this idea of "making everyone do the right and honorable thing, all the time." Such as, for example, the very, very negative implications of the idea that "society" (really, the government) outright owns your internal organs. Let's stick to education and (why hasn't been tried?) financial incentives, please.
    - Archio 9y ago
      Explain why making organ donation after death an opt-out process would have any negative tradeoffs, let alone a net negative effect.
      - meric 9y ago
        Someone who appear brain dead at first glance, their family might be pressured to turn off life support to take out the organs, to give to another person in the same hospital. If that first glance was mistaken and the person was in a coma that could recover months from now, then basically a man was killed for his organs.
        blonky 9y ago
        It is highly unlikely that the recipient is in the same hospital. The ER team who oversees the brain-dead person is not the same team who handles the organ transplantation. The docs who treat the patient with a failed liver aren't the people who decide where the organ(from the deceased donor) goes. This is a myth that needs to die. Doctors don't 'let someone die' because they are an organ donor. There's a complex system in place to regulate the distribution of organs. edit: I am a liver transplant recipient.
        9y ago

klipt 9y ago

> we need artificial organs Or a way to farm organs in the lab. If self driving cars succeed in massively reducing accident deaths (yay!) an unintended consequence will be huge shortfalls in donatable organs.

Teever 9y ago
All the more reason to make organ donation opt out or mandatory.
- kafkaesq 9y ago
  You know, at some point negative tradeoffs kick in when you try to go do far with this idea of "making everyone do the right and honorable thing, all the time." Such as, for example, the very, very negative implications of the idea that "society" (really, the government) outright owns your internal organs. Let's stick to education and (why hasn't been tried?) financial incentives, please.
  - Archio 9y ago
    Explain why making organ donation after death an opt-out process would have any negative tradeoffs, let alone a net negative effect.
    - meric 9y ago
      Someone who appear brain dead at first glance, their family might be pressured to turn off life support to take out the organs, to give to another person in the same hospital. If that first glance was mistaken and the person was in a coma that could recover months from now, then basically a man was killed for his organs.
      - blonky 9y ago
        It is highly unlikely that the recipient is in the same hospital. The ER team who oversees the brain-dead person is not the same team who handles the organ transplantation. The docs who treat the patient with a failed liver aren't the people who decide where the organ(from the deceased donor) goes. This is a myth that needs to die. Doctors don't 'let someone die' because they are an organ donor. There's a complex system in place to regulate the distribution of organs. edit: I am a liver transplant recipient.
      - 9y ago