Native Americans are shut out of US liver transplant system

Native Americans are much less likely than other racial groups to gain a spot on the US national liver transplant list, despite having the highest rate of death from liver disease. According to an analysis of four years of transplant data by The Markup and The Washington Post , for every 100 deaths from liver disease, only 9 Native American patients are accepted for transplant listing, the lowest rate among all racial groups studied. Native Americans are four times more likely to die from the disease than non-Hispanic White people, according to the US Department of Health and Human Services. It is the second leading cause of death among Indigenous men ages 35 to 44. With native Americans advancing to surgery at the same rate as White people, t he study showed that access to the live transplant list is a primary driver of disparity , with w hite people gain ing a spot on the transplant list almost three times more often than Native American s. However, experts said native Americans may not know that a liver transplant is an option, resulting in large numbers of Native Americans with liver problems dying untreated. System 🤖 United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) Operator: Developer: United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) Country: USA Sector: Health Purpose: Allocate liver transplants Technology: Ranking algorithm Issue: Bias/discrimination; Fairness Investigations, assessments, audits 🧐 The Markup (2024). A Death Sentence: Native Americans Shut Out of the Nation’s Liver Transplant System The Markup (2024). How We Investigated Racial Disparities in Liver Transplants The Markup (2023). Poorer States Suffer Under New Organ Donation Rules, As Livers Go to Waste The Markup (2023). An Algorithm Decides Who Gets a Liver Transplant. Here Are 5 Things to Know The Markup (2023). How We Investigated UNOS’s Liver Allocation Policy

Date it happened

2018-01-01

Product, system or model

UNet

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