Washington, D.C. – The House Ways and Means Committee is digging deep into serious claims against the New Jersey Organ and Tissue Sharing Network (NJTO), a group responsible for organ transplants in New Jersey. These claims come from several whistleblowers who have stepped forward with troubling information.
Representative Jason Smith (R-Mo.), who leads the Ways and Means Committee, and Representative David Schweikert (R-Ariz.), who heads the oversight subcommittee, have sent a formal letter to NJTO, outlining the allegations.
The whistleblowers accuse NJTO of several wrongdoings, including wrongly billing Medicare, covering up illegal actions, and taking organs from patients without their permission.
One particularly disturbing incident cited by the committee involves a patient at Virtua Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Camden, N.J. According to the allegations, the patient appeared to revive after being declared dead, just as doctors were preparing to harvest organs.
The committee believes that Carolyn Welsh, the president and CEO of NJTO, along with other leaders, told staff to proceed with organ harvesting despite the concerns. Hospital staff intervened and stopped the organ removal.
The committee expressed concerns about possible tampering with records related to this incident. “Several whistleblowers have alleged that documentation regarding this case has been deleted or otherwise manipulated,” the committee’s letter states. It also mentions that NJTO email servers were taken offline around the time emails related to the case were deleted.
The letter also points out that Welsh, who lacks medical training, reportedly made the decision to proceed from outside the hospital, even when hospital staff on-site had doubts about her decision.
Further accusations suggest that NJTO ignored patients’ wishes regarding organ donation. The committee was told of “several cases where, even though patients had removed the donor designation from their licenses, NJTO allegedly did not consider that to be a change of the original authorization to be an organ donor.” Whistleblowers also claim that the organization pressured families to agree to organ donation, sometimes even when the deceased were not registered organ donors.
Representative Smith emphasized the importance of trust in the organ transplant system. “Families place extraordinary trust in this system at the most painful moments of their lives, and what we have uncovered puts the integrity of America’s organ procurement system at stake,” he stated. “Every organization entrusted with this life-saving work must meet the highest standards, and any refusal to do so is unacceptable.”
The committee has also accused Welsh of creating a “culture of fear and retaliation” within NJTO, making it difficult for employees to raise concerns.
Another specific allegation involves the handling of pancreases. The committee claims that NJTO may have misled Congress about its pancreas research program. “The Committee received damning evidence that NJTO potentially LIED to Congress regarding their pancreata research program in response to our inquiries,” Smith stated. While NJTO claimed that they were not discarding pancreases, internal records obtained by the committee suggest otherwise.
This is not the first time the committee has looked into NJTO. After sending a letter to the organization in July, Welsh responded with an email to her staff, stating that they were cooperating with the inquiry and confident in their practices. However, she also warned employees to direct any inquiries from the media or hospital partners to a specific authority within the organization and to prevent unauthorized individuals from entering their headquarters.
The investigation is ongoing, and the House Ways and Means Committee is expected to continue gathering information and evidence to determine the truth behind these serious allegations. The integrity of the organ donation system, and the trust placed in it by American families, hangs in the balance.
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