Kidneys that were deemed unsuitable for patients at Parkland hospital were allegedly given to others at UT Southwestern Medical Center.
A whistleblower in Dallas has filed a lawsuit containing disturbing allegations about the organ donation industry.
Patrek Chase, kidney transplant program director at Parkland Health in Dallas, claimed that patients at his hospital – which generally serves a poorer population – were passed over for a healthy organ in favor of patients at UT Southwestern Medical Center, which generally helps the affluent.
Peter Whoriskey, an investigative reporter for the Washington Post, spoke to the Texas Standard about the allegations.
This transcript has been edited lightly for clarity:
Texas Standard: You begin your story centering around a whistleblower in the healthcare field working at Parkland Health in Dallas. Can you say more about who this person is and what he noticed that led him down this path?
Peter Whoriskey: He was the administrative director for the kidney transplant program at Parkland hospital, and he noticed something that disturbed him quite a bit. He noticed that there was, over and over again, patients on the Parkland waiting list for kidneys being passed over and those kidneys were then going into patients at UT Southwestern.
In fact, he found 36 times in one year that there was an organ that could have gone to help somebody at the Parkland hospital waiting list, that the doctors at the time said, no, this kidney’s not good enough...
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