A hospital in Uwajima, Ehime Prefecture, which found itself in hot water recently after a recipient of a transplanted kidney and his lover were arrested on suspicion of paying cash to the kidney donor, has landed in another scandal.
The same doctor, at Uwajima Tokushukai Hospital, who conducted the September 2005 transplant of a kidney thought to have been purchased, has conducted separate transplants with weak or diseased kidneys. The doctor was found to have used kidneys from patients suffering from kidney cancer, benign tumors, aneurism, nephrosis or urethral strictures in at least 11 transplant operations. This is outrageous. It is so unexpected that the Transplant Law and the Japan Society for Transplantation does not have rules to prohibit the practice. A thorough investigation should be carried out to set down clear rules.
The most recent scandal involves more than one doctor. While the Uwajima doctor is believed to have extracted kidneys for six of the 11 transplants, his younger brother, also a doctor, apparently took kidneys at three hospitals in Okayama Prefecture for three transplants while another doctor removed kidneys at a hospital in Kagawa Prefecture for two transplants.