* A 49-year-old woman who died in late 2006 after administrative errors kept her name off the regional waiting list. Her name was supposed to be added to the list in March 2003 but wasn't added until two years later.
* A man who was taken off the regional waiting list in January 2006 even though he had not received a kidney. The man was re-listed in July 2006 when he returned to UC San Francisco. But he never received a kidney, and died at age 60 in September 2006.
* A woman, now 54, who went without a kidney transplant for 1 1/2 years after Kaiser declined a kidney donated on her behalf in April 2005. Kaiser said she was "too ill or unsuitable for the transplant at that time, which was blatantly untrue," Eisenberg said. She was later transferred to UC Davis, and received a kidney in late 2006.
* A man who received inadequate follow-up care. He had received a kidney transplant from UC San Francisco in 1998 and was transferred to Kaiser's program for ongoing follow-up care in 2004. But Kaiser physicians allegedly did not adjust his medication even though lab tests showed that the kidney was beginning to fail. By February 2005, the organ failed and he had to resume dialysis, forcing him to stop working; he lost his home because he couldn't make mortgage payments. The man, now 40, had to wait until early 2009 to get a new kidney, and "appears to have a reasonably good result," Eisenberg said.
Eisenberg declined to identify his clients by name to protect their privacy.
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ron.lin@latimes.com
