A 17-year-old Mexican girl who was the victim of a botched heart-lung transplant carried out in a Washington hospital has died.
Jesica Santillan was pronounced dead early yesterday evening and taken off life support shortly afterwards Duke University Medical Center spokeswoman Ms Amy Austell said.
A first life-saving transplant on February 7th went wrong after doctors gave Santillan organs with an A negative blood type instead of the O positive type she needed.
Her body rejected the new heart and lungs and she suffered a heart attack three days after the operation, pushing her to the brink of death.
A machine had kept her heart and lungs working since the botched operation.
In the hours after a second surgery transplanting organs of the correct blood type into Santillan, doctors said her new heart and lungs were performing as expected and she was breathing with the help of a ventilator after the four-hour operation.
Santillan has been unconscious since undergoing the first transplant operation.
In the hours after the second surgery doctors soon noticed "significant swelling and bleeding in her brain, which is life-threatening," according to the hospital's website.
Doctors announced the "irreversible" swelling of Santillan's brain on Friday.
AFP