Medical marijuana user dies without transplant | KOMO-TV – Seattle, Washington | News
SEATTLE (AP) – A musician who was denied a liver transplant because he used marijuana with medical approval under Washington state law to ease the symptoms of advanced hepatitis C died Thursday.The death of Timothy Garon, 56, at Bailey-Boushay House, an intensive care nursing center was confirmed to The Associated Press by his lawyer, Douglas Hiatt, and Alisha Mark, a spokeswoman for Virginia Mason Medical Center, which operates Bailey-Boushay.
Dr. Brad Roter, the physician who authorized Garon to smoke pot to alleviate for nausea and abdominal pain and to stimulate his appetite, said he did not know it would be such a hurdle if Garon were to need a transplant.
The case has highlighted a new ethical consideration for those allocating organs for transplant, especially in the dozen states that have medical marijuana laws: When dying patients need a transplant, should it be held against them if they’ve used pot with a doctor’s blessing?
Garon died a week after his doctor told him a University of Washington Medical Center committee had again denied him a spot on the liver transplant list because of his use of marijuana, although it was authorized under Washington state law.
“He said I’m going to die with such conviction,” Garon told an AP reporter at the time. “I’m not angry, I’m not mad, I’m just confused.”
Garon believes he contracted hepatitis C by sharing needles with “speed freaks” as a teenager. In recent years, he said, pot has been the only drug he’s used. In December, he was arrested for growing marijuana.
He had been in the hospice for two months and previously was rejected for a transplant at Swedish Medical Center for the same reason he later got from the university hospital.
Swedish said he would be considered if he avoided pot for six months and the university hospital offered to reconsider if he enrolled in a 60-day drug treatment program, but doctors said his liver disease was too advanced for him to last that long. The university hospital committee agreed to reconsider anyway, then denied him again.
The idea of keeping drug addicts off of transplant lists is not necessarily a bad idea. There are precious few organs to go around, and one should not be given to a person who is just likely to destroy the new organ because of their addictions. But this is clearly not the case with medical marijuana patients.
The grim irony here is that Garon could have used other drugs to treat his hepatitis symptoms, but those pharmaceuticals are toxic to the very liver he needed to be transplanted. He used medical marijuana because of its lack of liver toxicity. Perhaps it is what kept him alive as long as he was; perhaps the other drugs would have killed him more quickly.
Doctors in charge of the transplant division at UWMC were unsure that after the transplant, Garon wouldn’t resume using medical marijuana. Most of their quotes revealed an astonishing lack of understanding about cannabis, with worries about Garon being unable to control a so-called addiction to cannabis, that, had he continued smoking cannabis, his immune system, suppressed for the transplant, would be unable to fight off any infections or molds he might pick up from smoking.
A man is dead today because of ignorance about medical marijuana, stereotypes against responsible cannabis users, and the cruel federal prohibition of the most helpful plant known to mankind.
[...] Timothy Garon was a Seattle musician who had contracted Hepatitis C. Garon was on a waiting list for a life-saving liver transplant. The state of Washington recognizes Hep C as a qualifying condition for the medical use of cannabis. Garon’s physician, Dr. Brad Roter, authorized Garon to smoke pot to alleviate his nausea and abdominal pain and to stimulate his appetite while he awaited. Garon had become dangerously thin and malnourished and the cannabis therapy helped bring him back from the brink of death. [...]
[...] Timothy Garon was a Seattle musician who had contracted Hepatitis C. Garon was on a waiting list for a life-saving liver transplant. The state of Washington recognizes Hep C as a qualifying condition for the medical use of cannabis. Garon’s physician, Dr. Brad Roter, authorized Garon to smoke pot to alleviate his nausea and abdominal pain and to stimulate his appetite while he awaited. Garon had become dangerously thin and malnourished and the cannabis therapy helped bring him back from the brink of death. [...]
[...] Timothy Garon was a Seattle musician who had contracted Hepatitis C. Garon was on a waiting list for a life-saving liver transplant. The state of Washington recognizes Hep C as a qualifying condition for the medical use of cannabis. Garon’s physician, Dr. Brad Roter, authorized Garon to smoke pot to alleviate his nausea and abdominal pain and to stimulate his appetite while he awaited. Garon had become dangerously thin and malnourished and the cannabis therapy helped bring him back from the brink of death. [...]
That’s so sad to hear about. Sick people are sick people, regardless of what drugs they use to cope. It’s horrible that he used medical marijuana because other drugs would have harmed him, and it was the marijuana that prevented him from getting the transplant. There’s so many things wrong with that picture, it’s not even funny…
Look forward to hearing him. He will be in a way born again. Who exactly made the decicion to not allow him a transplant?
Hello I am Tim’s Brother Andy.
Tim’s Dr. Did Exactly the Correct Thing Giving Tim the Medical Marijuana!
I have had the Same disease Over 20 Years. I know what helped me and what did not. I am still here. All of the Facts about Tim and what has Happened Here I am Aware of. You are aware of only parts of the story that has led you to an incorrect conclusion. Tim was a Trendsetter to say the least. Tim’s music and Lyrics have Yet to touch your Heart. The Whole tale is being compiled. You Will Hear of my Brother Again. Marshall,Mn is a Beautiful Town! Just a bit Cold in the Winter. We were raised in Minneapolis.
[...] decry the decision to deny a patient an organ transplant because of cannabis patenly unfair. A blog on the website of the marijuana advocacy group NORML, says that quotes from officials at the [...]
It really is sickening.