Liver transplants stopped temporarily at NYC hospital

NEW YORK -- A Manhattan hospital has temporarily stopped liver transplant surgeries involving live donors and adult recipients because a man died after donating part of his liver to his brother.

Mount Sinai Hospital is investigating the death of Mike Hurewitz, who died three days after donating part of his liver to his 54-year-old brother, The New York Times reported Wednesday.

Hurewitz, a 57-year-old journalist who had worked for the Albany Times Union since 1994, died Sunday. His brother survived.

State health officials said they would send investigators to Mount Sinai. Dr. Antonia Novello, the state health commissioner, told the Times Union that the hospital notified state officials immediately after the death, and that she had no reason to suspect it did anything improper.

Hurewitz was the first liver donor to die at the hospital, which uses more living donors for liver transplants than any other hospital in the country, the Times reported. The hospital refused to discuss details of the death.

The hospital will continue live-donor liver transplants from adults to children, transplants from cadavers, and kidney transplants, the Times said.

In liver transplants involving live donors, a section of liver taken from the donor regenerates once transplanted. Transplants from adults to other adults are riskier than those to children because a larger piece of the donor's liver must be transplanted.

The adult-to-adult transplants have raised ethical questions about the risks of performing surgery on healthy donors. Doctors estimate the risk of a donor dying in the operation at about 0.5 to 1 percent.

Mount Sinai performs about 35 adult-to-adult living donor operations a year, totaling about 100 since 1998. About 1,000 live-donor liver transplants have been performed in adults and children in the United States in the last 10 years.