St. Patrick's Day, March Madness, and Steve Jobs' Liver

Many Americans are probably rubbing their temples and wandering around with a bit of a post-St. Patrick's day hangover. Reader theodp writes with a sobering statistical consequence of traditional heavy-drinking holidays: "Keep in mind that this time of year has traditionally been very good to those awaiting organ transplants, including the late Steve Jobs, as Walter Isaacson explained in Jobs: 'By late February 2009 Jobs had secured a place on the Tennessee list (as well as the one in California), and the nervous waiting began. He was declining rapidly by the first week in March, and the waiting time was projected to be twenty-one days. 'It was dreadful,' Powell recalled. 'It didn't look like we would make it in time.' Every day became more excruciating. He moved up to third on the list by mid-March, then second, and finally first. But then days went by. The awful reality was that upcoming events like St. Patrick's Day and March Madness (Memphis was in the 2009 tournament and was a regional site) offered a greater likelihood of getting a donor because the drinking causes a spike in car accidents. Indeed, on the weekend of March 21, 2009, a young man in his mid-twenties was killed in a car crash, and his organs were made available.'"

Comments

Fortunately for Jobs

[Snufu]

Organ donation was open source.

Re:Fortunately for Jobs

[buchner.johannes]

If it were GPL, every recipient would be required to pass his organs on upon his death. And the organ would perpetually be passed on, because organs want to be free.

Actually not just the organ he received, but all his organs, because the other components require the one received. Although I guess you can argue a generic API.

Re:Fortunately for Jobs

[bigwheel]

GPL Sounds reasonable. In order to receive organs from other donors, you must also consent to be a donor.

Re:Jobs didn't promote the cause of organ donation

[i kan reed]

As someone who respects Gates' post-wealth philanthropy, finds Apple products to be over-marketed while uninteresting technically, and loves poetic justice:

I don't think you can expect every human being in society to be personally responsible for every kind of problem that exists. There's just not enough time in your life.

Had he not waited. . .

[smooth wombat]

until the last second to begin real treatment, things might have turned out better.

Instead, Jobs abandoned common sense and reason in favor of hocus pocus, "alternative" crap which did absolutely nothing to help his condition and may in fact have contributed to its severity.

There's a reason real medicines are tested and "alternative medicine" isn't. If they weren't alternative, they would be listed as medicine, used every day and give tangible results.

Re:Had he not waited. . .

[kimvette]

FWIW there are plenty of herbs which do work for specific ailments or enhance certain bodily functions, but unfortunately the real benefits of a handful of herbs are associated with a whole lot of bullcrap and hype such as homeopathy (where it is claimed a "molecular imprint" becomes stronger/more effective the more you dilute it, such that there may not even be any of the specified compount present in the vial), and is also associated with the likes of anti-vaxxers.

The biggest problem with herbal remedies is there are few scientific studies done to back up the claims, and most of the herbal remedy vendors of course are probably very disinterested in backing such studies, and the homeopathy vendors (the makers of those little vials which have "30x"/"60x"/"240x"/etc. numbers on them) know what they're selling is false hope/snake oil/bullshit so they certainly would not back formalized peer-reviewed studies.

But, there are herbs (garlic for example) which can help fight certain sicknesses and lower cholesterol, herbs (ginseng) which can tweak your metabolic rate, herbs (cannabis, chaparral, milk thistle, and others) which help fight cancer (NOT as a primary treatment but in addition to chemotherapy, cyberknife/radiation, etc), herbs which can increase lactation (goats' rue, fenugreek, anise, blessed thistle, fennel), and so on. But trying to sort out the legitimate from the nonsense is difficult at best due to the lack of formalized studies; one only has anecdotes to go by.

To rely only on herbal remedies was indeed foolish in Jobs' case. As it is only 20% last beyond one year with treatment. Last week I lost a friend to pancreatic cancer - he did herbals in conjunction with chemo and lasted four and a half years after diagnosis (his prognosis was 3 months when diagnosed). He improved for a bit, then got much worse when he decided he had enough and quit all treatments (western medicine and herbal, including cannabis), then got back on after it metastasized, and then from there it was a rapid progression of the cancer.

Pancreatic cancer is no joke - people like Steve Jobs (Apple Computer), Richard Wright (Pink Floyd), Luciano Pavarotti (Operatic tenor), Patrick Swayze (actor) all go to prove that all the money in the world can't save you.

I lost two friends to pancreatic cancer in the last year in a half and in both cases it was partly their fault for getting false hope and quitting treatments when their tumors were down to "almost" nothing. Please don't screw around with herbals or at minimum don't rely on just herbals - see an oncologist and maybe, just maybe you'll be among the 4% that beat it. I will always wonder if my friends could have ultimately beaten it.

Ultimately the best treatment is risk management: don't smoke, manage stress properly, eat few to no processed foods, don't overload on refined carbs, and get plenty of exercise. Preventive measures are free and far more effective than any treatment after the fact but even then it doesn't guarantee you won't get stricken with it.

Re:Had he not waited. . .

[the eric conspiracy]

One thing to be aware of is that there is more than one type of pancreatic cancer. The most common type (95%) is very aggressive and by the time it is detected in most people it is too late. 5 year survival of stage 1 cases is only 12%.

The other type (5%) creates slow growing or even benign (neuroendocrine) tumors. This is what Steve Jobs had. 5-year survival of stage 1 cases is 61%.

Steve Jobs delayed treatment by going off on alternative medicine until the cancer advanced to stage IV. At that point survival rates are 15% or so.

Basically Steve committed misguided suicide. Who ever advised him in this foolish escapade should be in jail.

Jobs DID promote the cause of organ donation

[Anonymous Coward]

How clueless you are.
He did indeed promote organ donations. Actively.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhKzyAoiTJE

http://www.tuaw.com/2010/03/19/steve-jobs-helps-push-organ-donation-legislation/

http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_14710654

http://www.forbes.com/sites/velocity/2010/04/20/how-steve-jobs-got-sick-got-better-and-decided-to-save-some-lives/

Need more evidence?

Re:Jobs didn't promote the cause of organ donation

[tbuddy]

Other than the $52 million to hospitals. He promoted organ donation heavily after receiving his much like Michael J Fox did with Parkinson's and Christopher Reeve did paralysis.

Irony?

[linear a]

Wouldn't you expect St. Patrick's day to *reduce* the overall number of livers available.

Re:Jobs is rich - why not do a deal for an organ?

[plopez]

Great Free Market solution! If you hadn't posted anonymously I would have given you the "Obvious Simple Common Sense Libertarian Post" Award. It is people like you who made America what it is today!

Re:Jobs didn't promote the cause of organ donation

[bitt3n]

Christopher Reeve did paralysis.

Christopher Reeve didn't so much as raise a finger to promote awareness of his condition.