Transplant surgeon faces trial on abuse charge

A transplant surgeon accused of illegally hastening the death of a prospective organ donor must stand trial on one of three felony charges filed against him, a judge ruled Wednesday.

Set for arraignment April 9, the case against Dr. Hootan Roozrokh will be the first such trial in the U.S. The charges have been a source of unease among transplant professionals, who fear they’ll dissuade donors and aggravate nationwide shortages of vital organs.

In his 12-page ruling, San Luis Obispo Superior Court Judge Martin Tangeman said evidence at the preliminary hearing failed to support two of the charges -- administering a harmful substance and prescribing controlled substances without a legitimate medical purpose -- which he threw out.

However, he ordered Roozrokh, 34, to stand trial on a charge of dependent adult abuse in the 2006 death of 25-year-old Ruben Navarro, who suffered from a wasting neurological condition and was brought to Sierra Vista Regional Medical Center in a coma from which he never emerged.

Roozrokh, a San Francisco surgeon who was assigned to harvest organs for a regional transplant network, is accused of trying to speed Navarro’s death with massive doses of the painkiller morphine and the antianxiety drug Ativan. Navarro’s mother had consented to a transplant as her son lay unconscious, breathing with the help of a ventilator and showing only minimal brain activity.

After the breathing apparatus was removed, he lived another seven hours -- far too long for his failing organs to be of use to others, according to testimony at the hearing.

For Roozrokh, “this was beat-the-clock time, and time was running out,” said prosecutor Karen Gray during closing arguments Wednesday. Roozrokh and his surgical team were hoping Navarro would be a candidate for “donation after cardiac death” -- an uncommon procedure in which patients with catastrophic brain injuries, but whose hearts are still beating, die after their breathing tubes have been removed.

Although testimony showed a hospital staff working in confusion and without any experience in donations after cardiac death, Gray contended that the surgeon broke the law when he ordered drugs for the patient whose organs he hoped to harvest.

Roozrokh’s attorney, M. Gerald Schwartzbach, said his client jumped in where Navarro’s attending physician and other hospital staff had failed.

In chronic pain, Navarro had developed a tolerance to drugs such as morphine and required high doses to ease the suffering he could not express, Schwartzbach said.

“The drugs did not affect him adversely,” said Schwartzbach, adding that witnesses could not agree on how much had been administered.

“What he’s essentially being accused of is trying to ensure that Mr. Navarro died peacefully,” he said. “That’s not criminal negligence.”

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