Kimberly Liew filed a medical malpractice claim against the NYU doctors who gave her husband a cancer-ridden kidney in 2002. The case went all the way to a jury trial, but on May 28, 2010, the jury ultimately found the doctors were not at fault in Mr. Liew's death, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Mr. Liew, a 37-year-old man, received the kidney in early 2002 from a 50-year-old woman who died after having a stroke. Weeks after the transplant, his doctors learned that the donor had uterine cancer when she died. They then allegedly informed Mr. Liew that although the safest plan of action would be to remove the kidney, there was a "slim" chance that he would actually catch cancer from the organ if he kept it. Mr. Liew, who had hated dialysis treatments, chose to keep the kidney. Sadly, Mr. Liew in fact did get cancer and, although the kidney was later removed, the disease had already spread through his body. He died in September 2002. In the lawsuit, his wife argued that doctors should have removed the kidney when they learned the donor had cancer.
In the end, jurors apparently sided with NYU's doctors, who claimed that the chance of Mr. Liew developing cancer from the transplant truly was small, and that Mr. Liew had fought hard to keep his kidney, despite being warned of the potential consequences.
Organ transplants can be life-saving. However, these procedures can sometimes cause new health problems for the individual receiving the transplant. Despite screening for infectious diseases that is required prior to organ donations, cases of undiagnosed malignancies being transmitted do occur.
If you or someone you know may have been the victim of medical malpractice or medical negligence, contact Paulsen & Armitage, LLC for assistance. Our attorneys fight for the rights of the injured and seek the maximum monetary damages available to compensate our clients for the harm they have suffered at the hands of careless or incompetent doctors, hospitals, and health care providers.
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