A Death Retold

by Wailoo, Keith

• ISBN13: 9780807830598
• ISBN10: 0807830593
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2006-11-01
• Publisher: Univ of North Carolina Pr

Summary

In February 2003, an undocumented immigrant teen from Mexico lay dying in a prominent American hospital due to a stunning medical oversight--she had received a heart-lung transplantation of the wrong blood type. In the following weeks, Jesica Santillan's tragedy became a portal into the complexities of American medicine, prompting contentious debate about new patterns and old problems in immigration, the hidden epidemic of medical error, the lines separating transplant "haves" from "have-nots," the right to sue, and the challenges posed by "foreigners" crossing borders for medical care. This volume draws together experts in history, sociology, medical ethics, communication and immigration studies, transplant surgery, anthropology, and health law to understand the dramatic events, the major players, and the core issues at stake. Contributors view the Santillan story as a morality tale: about the conflicting values underpinning American health care; about the politics of transplant medicine; about how a nation debates deservedness, justice, and second chances; and about the global dilemmas of medical tourism and citizenship. Contributors: Charles Bosk, University of Pennsylvania Leo R. Chavez, University of California, Irvine Richard Cook, University of Chicago Thomas Diflo, New York University Medical Center Jason Eberl, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis Jed Adam Gross, Yale University Jacklyn Habib, American Association of Retired Persons Tyler R. Harrison, Purdue University Beatrix Hoffman, Northern Illinois University Nancy M. P. King, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Barron Lerner, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health Susan E. Lederer, Yale University Julie Livingston, Rutgers University Eric M. Meslin, Indiana University School of Medicine and Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis Susan E. Morgan, Purdue University Nancy Scheper-Hughes, University of California, Berkeley Rosamond Rhodes, Mount Sinai School of Medicine and The Graduate Center, City University of New York Carolyn Rouse, Princeton University Karen Salmon, New England School of Law Lesley Sharp, Barnard and Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health Lisa Volk Chewning, Rutgers University Keith Wailoo, Rutgers University

Table of Contents

Introduction : chronicles of an accidental death	p. 1
America's angel or thieving immigrant? : media coverage, the Santillan story, and publicized ambivalence toward donation and transplantation	p. 19
Hobson's choices : matching and mismatching in transplantation work processes	p. 46
The transplant surgeon's perspective on the bungled transplant	p. 70
From Libby Zion to Jesica Santillan : many truths	p. 82
All things twice, first tragedy then farce : lessons from a transplant error	p. 97
The politics of second chances : waste, futility, and the debate over Jesica's second transplant	p. 119
Tucker's heart : racial politics and heart transplantation in America	p. 142
Justice in organ allocation	p. 158
Playing with matches without getting burned : public confidence in organ allocation	p. 180
Consuming differences : post-human ethics, global (in)justice, and the transplant trade in organs	p. 205
Sympathy and exclusion : access to health care for undocumented immigrants in the United States	p. 237
Eligibility for organ transplantation to foreign nationals : the relationship between citizenship, justice, and philanthropy as policy criteria	p. 255
Imagining the nation, imagining donor recipients : Jesica Santillan and the public discourse of belonging	p. 276
Babes and baboons : Jesica Santillan and experimental pediatric transplant research in America	p. 299
Jesica speaks? : adolescent consent for transplantation and ethical uncertainty	p. 329
Fame and fortune : the "simple" ethics of organ transplantation	p. 349
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