Report tells of errors in organ case

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http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-transplant2mar02,0,3305861,full.story

Report tells of errors in organ case

U.S. regulators detail how a potential donor was given huge doses of sedatives

and painkillers as six people watched.

By Weber and Ornstein, Times Staff Writers

March 2, 2007

It was to be the final medical procedure for Navarro, an altruistic end to

the life of a critically ill 26-year-old who doctors said had no chance to

recover.

Staffers at Sierra Vista Regional Medical Center in San Obispo were to

disconnect him from the machine pumping oxygen into his lungs. After his heart

stopped, transplant surgeons were to remove his organs so they could be used to

save the lives of others.

But in the late night quiet of an operating room Feb. 3, 2006, plans for that

dignified end went terribly awry, according to a 76-page report by federal

inspectors released this week in response to a Freedom of Information Act

request from The Times.