Organ donor group told Camden hospital to harvest from patient who showed signs of life, U.S. lawmakers say

An organ donation group allegedly pressured staff at a South Jersey hospital to continue the retrieval process on a patient who showed signs of life, per a congressional investigation.

The incident is referenced in a letter Wednesday from the U.S. House Committee on Ways and Means to Carolyn Welsh, the president and CEO of New Jersey Organ and Tissue Sharing Network. The letter is part of an ongoing congressional investigation into organ procurement organizations like NJTO.

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NJTO had obtained consent to recover organs from a patient at Virtua Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Camden earlier this year, the letter claims. After the donor was pronounced dead, staff began the operation. Soon into the procedure, however, the patient showed signs of life. When an administrator contacted Welsh, the letter claims, she directed the team to continue operating.

Hospital staff intervened to stop the procedure, the letter says. Virtua and NJTO did not respond to requests for comment.

This account comes from whistleblowers who claim documentation has been "deleted or otherwise manipulated" to cover up the incident, Reps. Jason Smith (R-Missouri), the committee chair, and David Schweikert (R-Arizona), the subcommittee chair, wrote in their letter. The lawmakers also accused Welsh of orchestrating a pressure campaign.

"It is the Committee's understanding not only that the NJTO staff on site continued to pressure the hospital staff to proceed with the donation, but also that you were the individual who made the decision to continue with the process of donation with knowledge of the donor's reanimation," the letter reads. "The Committee further understands that you — someone with no clinical training — decided to proceed from outside of the hospital, even while the hospital staff on site shared concerns about your decision."

The committee also accused NJTO of failing to obtain proper consent from donors' families, skipping patients on transplant lists and obscuring a mass discard of 100 pancreases obtained for research. It has given the organization until Dec. 3 to produce requested documents and subjects for interviews.

In April, the committee asked the public for evidence that organ procurement groups were not adhering to the laws that govern them as tax-exempt organizations. That request, Smith and Schweikert say, produced information about NJTO's allegedly fraudulent practices. The House committee reached out to NJTO for more information in July, and says it has since uncovered more evidence of potentially illegal operations.

"Tax-exempt organizations receive special tax treatment and are bound to adhere to a certain set of guidelines that benefit their communities," Smith wrote Wednesday in a social media post. "The allegations against NJTO are deeply troubling and do not serve the best interests of American taxpayers. Our tax code should not subsidize organizations that harm Americans, which is why I am DEMANDING NJTO explain themselves."

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