AURORA, Colo. — While he’s healthy now, eventually Brian Martin will need life-saving transplant surgery as cancer continues to manifest in his liver.
“I keep on having these cancerous lesions pop up, and what they do is…. they go ahead and treat it,” Martin said of his current treatment plan until he will need a new liver.
However, a transplant for Martin won’t come at UCHealth after doctors denied him a spot on their liver transplant list earlier this year because of a cutoff age limit of 70, according to his lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court in Colorado.
The lawsuit names UCHealth Hepatology Clinic and Transplant Center as a defendant.
Martin said a doctor denied him a spot on the transplant list during an appointment in February, a few weeks after his 70th birthday.
“Defendant gave no other reason for denying plaintiff’s request for a liver transplant and, in fact, it did no analysis of plaintiff’s suitability for receiving a transplant prior to denying his transplant request,” his lawsuit reads.
Martin claimed he was denied solely because of his age, he and makes the claim UC Health is violating federal regulations that prohibit age discrimination by entities that receive federal funding.
“We have three written statements from the hospital and doctors saying that Brian was turned down for the liver transplant because he was over 70,” Martin’s attorney, Robert Liechty, told 9NEWS.
The lawsuit cites one of the doctor’s notes, which partially reads “We discussed at our center age of 70 is a strict cutoff.”
9NEWS Legal Analyst Whitney Traylor said it appears the evidence from doctors’ writings could be a significant obstacle for UCHealth to push against if the case goes to trial.
“The facts will come out, but if there is a direct statement from the doctor saying we don’t do this for people over 70, that’s what we call direct evidence and that’s really difficult to overcome,” Traylor said.
A spokesperson said they could not comment directly on a patient’s case, but a statement from UCHealth said age is not the only factor doctors consider.
Here is the hospital's statement in full:
“The UCHealth Transplant Center, part of University of Colorado Hospital, is the Rocky Mountain Region’s largest transplant center, providing more than 550 transplants each year. The transplant center’s top priority is to ensure excellent outcomes for patients and donated organs, and clinical teams use a comprehensive, evidence-based evaluation to determine whether patients are likely to have positive outcomes and should be placed on a transplant list. Age is one of many factors, but not the only factor, when evaluating whether a patient is an appropriate candidate for a transplant, and UCHealth has provided transplants to patients of all ages, including those over 70.”
Martin said receiving news of denial was like a “death sentence,” but there is some promising news.
A few months after his denial at UCHealth, Martin said he was placed on a transplant list at another Colorado hospital and is currently waiting for a transplant.
He said he hopes his lawsuit will compel changes at UCHealth.
"The more I've delved into this, I guess the angrier I got. It’s just not right,” Martin said.
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