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| Prison blocks inmate from donating organ |
| By Times Picayune |
| Published: 01/03/2005 |
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Charlene Wiltz needs a kidney, and Stephen Stage is willing to give her one of his, but he may not even get the chance to learn whether he's a match with the New Orleans grandmother. Stage, 53, is an Orleans Parish Prison inmate who is serving a four-year sentence for aggravated battery. The prison can't let Stage act on his gesture because it would be a drain on the budget and staff of the Orleans Parish Criminal Sheriff's Office, which runs the prison, said Dr. Demaree Inglese, its medical director. The Sheriff's Office's delicate dance involving the inmate's unexpected offer is in line with policies at the state and federal level that don't always prohibit organ donation but make it difficult to bring off, officials say. Wiltz, 45, went into kidney failure after heart surgery. As a result, she has had to undergo four-hour dialysis sessions three times a week for the past four years. Her eldest daughter is a match, but Wiltz said she has refused to donate. Wiltz is on the national waiting list for a kidney, but, she said, "I know I'm way down there." Stage learned of Wiltz's plight from a story in The Times-Picayune, and he responded in a letter to the newspaper. Citing Sheriff's Office policy, the prison did not make Stage available for an interview. But he probably won't get the chance to do so. Even though Medicaid, Wiltz's insurer, would cover all medical fees, including a blood test to determine whether she could receive Stage's kidney, Inglese said transferring deputy sheriffs to a hospital to guard Stage around the clock would be a drain on the department's already tight budget and leave the prison vulnerable. That money "is the taxpayers' money," he said. "The Orleans Parish Criminal Sheriff's Office doesn't have the right to donate that money so someone can have a kidney transplant. . . . We need the money for people in the jail to receive health care, not people in the community." Even though Stage is in Orleans Parish Prison, he is a state inmate, a status that makes him subject to laws governing the state Department of Safety and Corrections. One provision bars use of state money to pay costs associated with organ transplants, but the law doesn't prohibit an inmate from participating in a transplant if someone else pays the expenses, Corrections Department spokeswoman Pam Laborde said. She said another provision of state law that prohibits prisoners from participating in medical experiments or pharmaceutical trials would not apply to Stage's situation. If Stage were a federal prisoner, he would be prohibited from donating his kidney except to a member of his immediate family, according to the regulations of the federal Bureau of Prisons. The federal rules also require all expenses, including the cost of U.S. Marshal Service guards, be paid by someone other than the government. |
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