My Sister Died Waiting for a Transplant. The System Is Set Up for Heartbreak | The Walrus

"Both Canada (where I live) and the United States (where Shauna died) keep databases with statistics on wait lists, transplants, and "wait list removals." In North America, more than 1,000 patients still die annually waiting for a new liver. Every year, thousands of patients are listed for a transplant. Approximately 10 to 25 percent of those people become "delisted.""

"In 2004, the year Shauna died, in the US region where she resided, there were 448 liver transplants and 168 deaths on the wait list. Eleven of those deaths were patients between the ages of eighteen and thirty-four. Shauna was one of those eleven people."

A woman's sister Shauna died at age twenty-nine while waiting eighteen months for a liver transplant, the only potential cure for her end-stage liver disease. During her wait, Shauna's health declined rapidly and she died in an intensive care unit. Her death left friends and family struggling to offer appropriate condolences. North American transplant databases reveal a stark reality: more than 1,000 patients die annually waiting for liver transplants. Thousands are listed yearly, but 10-25% become delisted. Some succumb to wait list mortality while others are deemed too sick to survive surgery. In the US region where Shauna died in 2004, there were 448 liver transplants and 168 deaths on the wait list, including eleven patients aged eighteen to thirty-four.

Read at The Walrus