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University of Toledo Nurse Throws Away Kidney Ready for Transplantation

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In what can be called as an unfortunate and one-of-a-kind incident, a nurse from the University of Toledo Medical Centre inadvertently threw away a kidney from a man along with other medical waste.

According to a detailed report by The Blade, the kidney was about to be transplanted to the man's older sister who was suffering from a terminal renal disease.

David Grossman, Toledo-Lucas County health commissioner, confirmed the accident.

Officials from the hospital spoke about the Aug. 10 incident this week, which resulted in the donated kidney being rendered unusable. They did not delve into the details about how the kidney was damaged beyond repair.

Following the incident, two nurses, Melanie Lemay, a full-time nurse, and Judith Moore, a part-time nurse have been suspended from their jobs.

Sources 'with knowledge of botched surgery' said to The Blade, the doctor removed the donor's kidney, but it was accidentally thrown away by the nurse. Apparently, it took more than an hour to find the disposed kidney which was lost among other medical waste.

The Blade also reported that once the discarded kidney was found, doctors tried repeatedly over the course of two hours to resuscitate it, but remained unsuccessful.

Dr. Jeffrey Gold, chancellor and vice president for biosciences and health affairs at UTMC said that in normal circumstances, the kidney is transplanted to the patient within an hour of being removed from the donor.

"In the process of transferring a kidney from a donor, a human error rendered the kidney unusable," Dr. Gold said to The Blade Wednesday. "Efforts were made to restore the kidney to a usable state, however, the physician in consultation with the family decided to not take the risk knowing there was a good chance for another highly compatible donor."

The patient is now on a national waiting list for kidney donations.

A six-antigen match between the donor and the receiver is called 'perfect match', which increases the likelihood of the donor's body accepting the kidney. It can be easily found among siblings. Apparently, the man and his sister were a 'perfect match', but now she may have to wait a while longer.

Following the incident, UTMC has voluntarily cancelled its prestigious Kidney Transplantation Program.

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