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Case of Anthony Thomas ‘TJ’ Hoover II is under investigation by state and federal government officials
A man who had gone into cardiac arrest and been declared brain dead woke up as surgeons in his home state of Kentucky were in the middle of harvesting his organs for donation, his family has told media outlets.
As reported Thursday by both National Public Radio and the Kentucky news station WKYT, the case of Anthony Thomas “TJ” Hoover II is under investigation by state and federal government officials. Officials within the US’s organ-procurement system insist there are safeguards in place to prevent such episodes, though his family told the outlets their experience highlights a need for at least some reform.
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WKYT reported that Rhorer only learned the full details of her brother’s surgery at the hands of Baptist and the Kentucky Organ Donor Affiliates (Koda) in January. That’s when a former employee of Koda contacted her before sending a letter to a congressional committee that in September held a hearing scrutinizing organ-procurement organizations, NPR reported.
The letter’s author said she saw Hoover begin “thrashing” around on the operating table as well as start “crying visibly”, according to NPR.
This whole thing is nuts to me. From the way the article reads, the patient was likely still breathing and had a heartbeat. I get wanting to keep organs fresh, but this seems… non ideal
That’s a defining feature of brain dead. Otherwise, they’re just dead.
True, but for an organ harvest… would you not want the cadaver to be, well, dead dead? Like, would you start taking organs out while the cadaver still has a beating heart?
Once the heart stops beating, the organs fail. Including the heart itself.
That’s kind of the point of defining brain death. Normally death is declared after the heart stops beating. In brain death, the heart is beating but the brain is not receiving any blood.
Heartbeat, yes. Breathing, no. Once the brain is completely dead the body can’t breathe on its own, it has to be kept on a ventilator to keep the organs alive.
We are our brain activity and once that’s gone for good all that’s left is the biological machine that we live within.
A heart will beat as long as it doesn’t die or otherwise suffer some other structural failure. They attach brain dead patients to a ventilator to continue respiration to keep the now-vacant body alive. It’s a shame someone severely fucked up and compromised the safety and trust of the process in this case but don’t let this confuse you into thinking there’s no basis for the transplant to occur in the presence of a heartbeat.
Nah that’s not unusual. Brain trauma or degradation can and often does leave someone with a beating heart but little to no hope of ever being conscious again - hence the term brain death.