Think you don't need an organ donor opt-out card? Think again -- the Burns case

By Paul A. Byrne, M.D.

Very few people look forward to going to the doctor. Even fewer look forward to being a patient in a hospital. Some people have an irrational fear of hospitals. This is not a good thing. On the other hand, having a rational fear of hospitals these days is not only a good thing, it is a necessity given the high level of lust and desire for the speedy acquisition of vital organs that drives the transplantation industry. A case in point: the near (true) death of Colleen Burns.

According to the Syracuse Post-Standard, in October 2009, Colleen S. Burns, 41, was taken to the emergency room at St. Joseph's Hospital Health Center for assistance after suffering a drug overdose. The ER nurse who attended Burns reported to the doctors that the patient was recovering from the overdose, but the same physicians insisted that Burns was dead, and pronounced her so, making her "dead" for legal purposes and an eligible candidate for organ transplantation.

A call was placed to Colleen's family members informing them that she had passed away, and a pitch was made for organ retrievable. The still grieving family subsequently agreed to the withdrawal of life support and the harvesting of Colleen's vital organs for transplantation into waiting recipients.

The problem, of course, was that Colleen Burns, like all vital organ transplant donors, was not truly dead, because you can't retrieve healthy vital organs from a cadaver. In fact, all the evidence pointed to the fact that Colleen Burns was alive. When a nurse performed a mandatory reflex test on Colleen Burns, her toes curled downward. She was successfully breathing on her own, independent of a hospital respirator. And her lips and tongue were said to have moved moments before the transplant physician prepared to cleave her chest in two and begin extracting her vital organs.

At this point, one would think the transplant physician would have called for immediate aid for the donor, but instead, he ordered the attending nurse to administer a powerful sedative, so he could continue his mission, which was obviously to get at Burn's organs. The nurse complied, more interested in keeping her job than preventing the murder of a patient, but then, in her heart of hearts, the nurse always knew that you can't get viable organs from a corpse and that the organ donors to whom she administered the sedative were not "quite" dead. Hence the need to give donor patients paralyzing/anesthetic drugs to make sure they do not move while they are being hacked in two, at which point they are truly dead.

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 Dr. Paul A. Byrne is a Board Certified Neonatologist and Pediatrician. He is the Founder of the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at SSM Cardinal Glennon Children's Medical Center in St. Louis, MO. He is Clinical Professor of Pediatrics at University of Toledo, College of Medicine. He is a member of the American Academy of Pediatrics and Fellowship of Catholic Scholars.