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American Morning
How Could Doctors Make Such a Mistake in First Place?
Aired February 24, 2003 - 08:43 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: We're paging Dr. Gupta this morning about the tragic case of 17-year-old Jesica Santillan. Jesica, who was the victim of a botched heart-lung transplant, died Saturday after a second operation.
How could doctors make such a mistake in the first place? Sanjay joins us now from the CNN newsroom with more on the case.
Welcome back, Sanjay. Glad to have you back in the country.
I don't know whether you heard my interview with one of the family attorneys, but he's saying the family is going to comb over medical records and the autopsy report before they decide whether to sue Duke University.
But in the wake of all this, I'm sure you've heard during the course of people saying to you whether Jesica ever had a second chance at life with a second transplant operation, and it might have made more sense to give those organs to another candidate who might have had a better prospect of living?
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, I'LL tell you, Paula, you're raising a very interesting and a very concrete point when it comes to transplantation. Certainly, in the case of Jesica, even after the first transplant alone, the numbers aren't great in terms of overall survival. The way they measures these things and say, how likely is she to be live at five years, who likely at 10 years? The numbers aren't great after a first heart and double lung transplant. After a second one, Paula, those numbers drop off even considerably more. There are many in the medical community. There are many in the transplant community, who say, if you look at this from a micro and you look at it from macro level, from a macro level, these organs probably would have done more good somewhere else. That's a tough thing to hear. But I think from the macro level, there was so much public recognition of this case. There was probably a lot of guilt, quite honestly, on behalf of the Duke University and the surgeons and all that, to give her the best chance they thought.
But whether or not that was the best chance for the overall system as a whole, probably not, Paula. And again, that's a difficult thing to say, but I think that's probably what most transplant -- people in the transplant community would concede.
ZAHN: I was talking to someone over the weekend who trains residents at a major metropolitan hospital in New York, and she was saying that it's sort of an unwritten rule at hospitals that when a hospital makes a mistake, that the team will do everything in its power to right the mistake. Is that prevalent at other hospitals in the country as well?
GUPTA: Yes, I think that's just prevalent in medicine in general. All doctors and surgeons, it's more of an immediate sort of thing in surgery, because you know, you see the mistake, and you have this opportunity to sort of correct it possibly right away. And I think that that -- there is a large part of that. Again, you know, for Jesica, trying to give her the heart and two lungs right away was a priority for Jesica, but, you know, when you're talking about an area of limited resources, you're talking about only 197 people on the waiting list. You're talking about only 28 of these being done a year, then it becomes -- it's open to question as to whether or not that was absolutely the right decision. And I think you're bringing up a very interesting point in that.
ZAHN: Dr. Sanjay Gupta, as always, thanks for your perspective.
GUPTA: Good seeing you. Take care.
ZAHN: Glad to have you back.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired February 24, 2003 - 08:43 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: We're paging Dr. Gupta this morning about the tragic case of 17-year-old Jesica Santillan. Jesica, who was the victim of a botched heart-lung transplant, died Saturday after a second operation.
How could doctors make such a mistake in the first place? Sanjay joins us now from the CNN newsroom with more on the case.
Welcome back, Sanjay. Glad to have you back in the country.
I don't know whether you heard my interview with one of the family attorneys, but he's saying the family is going to comb over medical records and the autopsy report before they decide whether to sue Duke University.
But in the wake of all this, I'm sure you've heard during the course of people saying to you whether Jesica ever had a second chance at life with a second transplant operation, and it might have made more sense to give those organs to another candidate who might have had a better prospect of living?
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, I'LL tell you, Paula, you're raising a very interesting and a very concrete point when it comes to transplantation. Certainly, in the case of Jesica, even after the first transplant alone, the numbers aren't great in terms of overall survival. The way they measures these things and say, how likely is she to be live at five years, who likely at 10 years? The numbers aren't great after a first heart and double lung transplant. After a second one, Paula, those numbers drop off even considerably more. There are many in the medical community. There are many in the transplant community, who say, if you look at this from a micro and you look at it from macro level, from a macro level, these organs probably would have done more good somewhere else. That's a tough thing to hear. But I think from the macro level, there was so much public recognition of this case. There was probably a lot of guilt, quite honestly, on behalf of the Duke University and the surgeons and all that, to give her the best chance they thought.
But whether or not that was the best chance for the overall system as a whole, probably not, Paula. And again, that's a difficult thing to say, but I think that's probably what most transplant -- people in the transplant community would concede.
ZAHN: I was talking to someone over the weekend who trains residents at a major metropolitan hospital in New York, and she was saying that it's sort of an unwritten rule at hospitals that when a hospital makes a mistake, that the team will do everything in its power to right the mistake. Is that prevalent at other hospitals in the country as well?
GUPTA: Yes, I think that's just prevalent in medicine in general. All doctors and surgeons, it's more of an immediate sort of thing in surgery, because you know, you see the mistake, and you have this opportunity to sort of correct it possibly right away. And I think that that -- there is a large part of that. Again, you know, for Jesica, trying to give her the heart and two lungs right away was a priority for Jesica, but, you know, when you're talking about an area of limited resources, you're talking about only 197 people on the waiting list. You're talking about only 28 of these being done a year, then it becomes -- it's open to question as to whether or not that was absolutely the right decision. And I think you're bringing up a very interesting point in that.
ZAHN: Dr. Sanjay Gupta, as always, thanks for your perspective.
GUPTA: Good seeing you. Take care.
ZAHN: Glad to have you back.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
