Disaster of the HIV-infected organ transplant for 5 patients

Due to some errors, doctors used organs from an HIV-infected patient to transplant for 5 people. This is the most unfortunate incident in medical history, occurring at Taiwan National University Hospital.

According to China Times , President of Taiwan Organ Transplant, and director of Cheng Kung University Hospital (Taiwan, China), Libo Zhang said: "This is the biggest disaster in the medical industry and is also the worst medical record in Taiwan '.

The donor is a 37-year-old male, transferred to Hsinchu City General Hospital in the presence of a head injury and deep coma. The family did not know that he was HIV-infected and contacted the National Taiwan University Hospital for organ donation.

5 patients received the heart, liver, lungs and two kidneys from this person. Heart transplants are performed at Cheng Kung University Hospital for a 55-year-old man. The transplantation of other internal organs was conducted at Taiwan National University Hospital.

Representatives of Taiwan National University Hospital said health workers have asked the family to perform HIV test for donors. However, because of a disastrous mistake, this result was incorrectly recorded. Until the transplants were completed, the new Taiwan Medical University Hospital found previous data to be completely false and informed Cheng Kung University Hospital to monitor patients.

In a recent press conference, the spokesman of Taiwan National University Hospital, Ching-Ting Tan, acknowledged the patient's family's shortcomings and expressed regret about the incident. The hospital will continue to investigate the causes and take appropriate disciplinary measures with negligent employees who make mistakes.

Dr. Chien-Ching Hung, Department of Infectious Diseases, Taiwan National University Hospital said that it is currently impossible to know whether recipients of HIV are infected. According to him, need to do more molecular tests, take 1-2 months and follow up 6 months later to have an answer. However, he said, the likelihood of getting infected is quite high.