WASHINGTON — On Wednesday, two transplant doctors, one watchdog and a nephrologist-turned-advocate sat before members of Congress to talk about the nation’s troubled organ transplant system. For over two hours the House Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations ran through allegations of inefficiency, inertia, negligence and corruption in the groups charged with coordinating transplants throughout the U.S. New, jaw-dropping claims also came to light.
It’s been a year since the private nonprofit United Network for Organ Sharing lost its longtime job as the sole manager of the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network, or OPTN — a role UNOS had held since 1986. Now, the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) is seeking other contractors to run parts of the massive system that oversees tens of thousands of transplants per year. Disagreements about who should be involved in overhauling the OPTN and how it should be run have delayed that process, Politico reports.
News reports, congressional investigations and, more recently, federal probes, have made glaringly apparent the problems with the current transplant system. Many organs have gone uncollected in the past, and many have been thrown out, while people died on the waitlist. Just last month, Vox reported that nearly 7,000 donated pancreases were missing. Transportation problems have resulted in canceled transplants and organs gone bad. Patients awaiting a lifesaving graft are often unclear about where they stand, or what their options are.
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