organ mess, see Fox News Channel for details and context

Okay, remember the Big Mess with the Dutch reality TV show where viewers were going to telephone to choose who'd receive the dying lady's organs?

This Mess is Bigger.

The Chronicle is handling this as a somewhat routine criminal indictment story (notice it ran not on Page 1, but on B2 -- 2nd page of the Local section).

This story is being handled in a somewhat different context by a psycha freakazoid blogeusse named Debbie Schlussel , who ... oh, never mind. Click if you have a tough stomach.

Anyway, apparently Fox News Channel likes to use Debbie as an on-air news commentator, to illuminate the Muslim world for Fox's viewers. This woman is fucking nuts. I would have Left A Comment to that effect, but you have to register on her site to Leave A Comment, and I don't want this person to know how many ears I have.

But in the United States of America, anyone has the right to be fucking nuts, and blog it to the world.

It's Fox News Channel, which pays her to be fucking nuts and infect cable surfers with short attention spans, that deserves a little extra scrutiny. Fox News: Scare & Unbalanced.

Rupert Murdoch is at the top of the Fox News Channel food chain, but the Founding Honcho under him is Roger Ailes, who began his adventure in electron journalism as TV adviser to President Richard Nixon. Great job, Rog! A whole new bunch of documents concerning Ailes' valuable assistance and advice for Nixon were just released to the public when the Nixon Library turned control of its documents over to the National Archives.

(Ailes recommended that in public appearances, Nixon stop turning his back on his wife and pretending she wasn't there, Ailes didn't think that was making a great impression on female voters.)

One day about ten years ago, Kaiser Permanente just locked its doors and vanished from Massachusetts, and abandoned the thousands of people who'd been paying $$$ to provide their health care. Since then I like to call it Kaiser Temporaria.

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The San Francisco Chronicle (California USA)
Page B1
Tuesday 31 July 2007

Doctor charged with
hastening death of donor

by Erin Allday, Chronicle Staff Writer

A San Francisco transplant surgeon was charged Monday with prescribing overdoses of medication to speed up the death of a man at a San Luis Obispo hospital and harvest his organs.

Dr. Hootan Roozrokh, 33, prescribed excessive amounts of morphine and Ativan and injected the topical antiseptic Betadine into Ruben Navarro's stomach in February 2006, prosecutors in San Luis Obispo County said. Navarro, 26, who was severely disabled mentally and physically, had suffered respiratory and cardiac arrest and had been taken off life support, authorities said.

In order for doctors to harvest organs, a patient must be declared dead within 30 minutes of being taken off life support. Navarro, however, died eight hours after being removed from a respirator and his organs were never recovered.

Roozrokh is believed to be the first doctor in California ever accused of criminal charges in connection with procuring organs. He faces felony counts of dependent adult abuse, administering a harmful substance and unlawful prescription of a controlled substance.

A warrant has been issued for his arrest. If convicted of all three counts, he could be sentenced to eight years in state prison.

Roozrokh, who at the time was a surgeon with Kaiser Permanente's now-closed kidney transplant center in San Francisco, was in San Luis Obispo as part of a team that harvests organs of people who have just died.

State law forbids transplant doctors from treating potential organ donors before they are declared dead.

Kaiser placed Roozrokh on administrative leave Monday, officials at the health care group said. He voluntarily stopped seeing patients last year, after Navarro's family first accused him of trying to speed up the sick man's death.

Roozrokh's attorney, M. Gerald Schwartzbach of Mill Valley, said in a statement that the charges against the surgeon are "unfounded and ill advised" and said his client has been "the subject of an 18-month witch hunt."

"Nothing that Dr. Roozrokh did or said at the hospital that night adversely affected the quality of Mr. Navarro's life or contributed to Mr. Navarro's eventual death," Schwartzbach said. "Dr. Roozrokh did not commit any crime."

Navarro had been living in a nursing home when he suffered a respiratory and cardiac arrest Jan. 29, 2006. He was in a coma when he was taken to Sierra Vista Regional Medical Center in San Luis Obispo. Doctors there said he had suffered irreversible brain damage and he was put on a respirator, but he was not declared brain dead.

His mother gave approval to donate Navarro's organs, and on Feb. 3 the California Transplant Donor Network sent a surgical team, including Roozrokh, to San Luis Obispo to handle the organ recovery.

Earlier this year, the coroner's officer in San Luis Obispo County reported that Navarro had died of natural causes.

Navarro's mother filed a wrongful-death lawsuit last year against Roozrokh and several others, including the hospital, Kaiser and the California Transplant Donor Network, claiming that her son had been removed from life support without her permission and had been given lethal doses of drugs.

Kaiser officials said Monday that Roozrokh had been acting independently of their health care organization when he went to San Luis Obispo. Officials with the California Transplant Donor Network would not comment on the case.

- 30 -

The Associated Press contributed to this report. E-mail Erin Allday at eallday@sfchronicle.com

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comments
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midvanisle wrote:

This doc could get a job right away in China, where the organs of political dissidents are "harvested" while the victim is still alive. And most of the world looks the other way. BTW, did you know that China is a Communist dictatorship ?

Posted 7/31/2007 6:40:05 AM

ambrose_bierce_ wrote:

this doesnt surprise me at all. healthcare in SF is as lousy and conniving as it gets. from UCSF to Kaiser to California Pacific all they want is your money. Here's the kind of healthcare I get for my $500 a month: sunday night I unwittingliy ate some poisoned chinese ginger (see the news on that). terribly sick. though I was pretty well over it, I called my Dr yesterday, in case he thought I needed attention. He was out playing golf or something but they said he'd call me in the afternoon. He never called. This is totally typical. I should just pretend I am an illegal alien, I'd get the same care but at least I wouldnt have to pay for it

Posted 7/31/2007 6:51:08 AM

juliejf wrote:

Docta, Docta, heal your self. I'll take one Heart, one juicy Liver, two plump Kidneys, both green eyes, and your brain should be studied. For being Broken.

Posted 7/31/2007 7:16:54 AM

mcross wrote:

What happened to innocent until proven guilty? The second paragraph should include the word "allegedly" (at 7:15 am, it does not) or "is accused of." Also, presumably *someone* authorized the patient as a transplant candidate prior to the transplant doctors flying in, as this is standard medical practice. Notably, these injections did *not* hasten death, as the patient lived more than eight hours after being taken off life support (as the name implies, life support is used to keep patients alive--it is thought that they will die very quickly without support). On a different note, it seems that if doctors give morphine for pain, they are accused of pushing drugs; if they do not, they are accused of ignoring the patient's suffering.

Posted 7/31/2007 7:20:35 AM

sageworks wrote:

Can't help but wonder who would want the organs from someone who was severely mentally and physically disabled. Really. And i have a sneaking suspicion, no one would tell anyone that was the case. that is the real ethics violation!!!!! That may be a superstition on my part, but I bet it's one that 95% if not more of the population would share.

Posted 7/31/2007 8:25:21 AM

kimmieSF wrote:

This is EXACTLY what people fear if they are not already adverse to organ donation. If this is true, this guy kicked a lot of people who need organs right in the ass...

Posted 7/31/2007 8:36:22 AM

starislon wrote:

mcross is correct, this alleged perpetrator is innocent until proven guilty, in a court of law. That said, if found guilty, he definitely should do an indefinite sentence in a Chinese prison. Why not? California's prisons are over crowded, according to the NYT, the California authorities are planning on sending 8,000 prisoners out of state, to corporate run prisons for profit, anyway. If they could "harvest" a perpetrators organs, they probably would reduce the charges for care and feeding of the prisoner to the state. Another Win-Win(-Lose)! Such a deal!

Posted 7/31/2007 8:48:50 AM
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© 2007 Hearst Communications Inc.

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Kaiser Permanente
(US private health services provider)
page for Dr. Hootan Roozrokh
============

The Permanente Medical Group
Hootan Roozrokh, MD

Facility
San Francisco Medical Center
Surgery Department

Address
2238 Geary Blvd., 2nd Floor East
San Francisco, CA 94115
Map & Directions

Telephone
Advice: 415-833-3385
Appointments/Cancellations: 415-833-2127
Fax: 415-833-3235

If an interpreter is needed, please tell us when you make an appointment.

Department Hours
Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday
Closed 9:00 am
5:30 pm 9:00 am
5:30 pm 9:00 am
5:30 pm 9:00 am
5:30 pm 9:00 am
5:30 pm Closed

Please note that my office hours may be different from my department’s hours of operation.

My Biography

At Kaiser Permanente, I appreciate the ability to focus on tumors of the liver, bile ducts, pancreas, and esophagus. I am able to provide a high quality surgery for members. Kaiser’s integrated system attracts expert physicians, and affords me opportunities to work with top-notch GI specialists, radiologists, oncologists, and pathologists. We work as a team to deliver efficient, multidisciplinary approaches to cancer treatment. I think our members receive excellent care.

I have a particular interest in pathology of the foregut. I have specialized training in transplantation, which allows me to have a greater comprehension of surgical conditions affecting the foregut. I regularly attend professional conferences of the American College of Surgeons.

When I am away from work, my hobbies include racing cars and playing golf. I THRIVE by endeavoring to practice good karma.

Other Languages: Farsi

Undergraduate Education: B.S. in Applied Sciences, University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee
Professional Affiliations: American College of Surgeons; San Francisco Medical Society; American Society of Laparoscopic Surgeons; American Society of Transplant Surgeons

Year Began Practice: 2005
Joined Kaiser Permanente: 2005

My Credentials

Medical school Medical College of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, WI
Residency Mercy Hospital of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA
Fellowship Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
Board certification Surgery-General, American Board of Surgery

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Medical College of Wisconsin
Alumni Notes
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Hootan C. Roozrokh, MD '98, recently completed a fellowship in adult and pediatric multi-organ transplant surgery and hepatobiliary surgery at Stanford University Medical Center. He has joined the University of California-San Francisco and Kaiser Permanente-San Francisco in the Department of General and Multi-organ Transplant Surgery. His primary interests are in liver and pancreas transplant. Dr. Roozrokh and his wife, Sherry, have been married for five years.

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