An operation to give new hope to a Naples woman suffering from cirrhosis of the liver has turned to despair after doctors transplanted a cancerous liver into her body, Italian newspapers reported yesterday.
Ms Rita Borrelli (58), a mother of three, underwent the operation at a modern transplant clinic in the northern city of Modena at the end of last year. The liver of a road accident victim that was to have cured her cirrhosis has now left her battling against an even more implacable disease in Naples' Cardarelli Hospital.
"I waited for the transplant for two years and now that operation that was supposed to save my life has simply speeded up my death," Mrs Borrelli told reporters from her hospital bed.
"It was a real act of wickedness. By transplanting a diseased liver they wrote my death sentence, a real disgrace. For this reason I have decided to complain to the judicial authorities. I have very little chance of surviving, but I hope this affair will prevent the same thing from happening to other people," she said.
Mr Antonio Pinna, the surgeon, said an initial examination had shown the liver to be healthy and it was only towards the end of the operation that colleagues in Naples informed him that they had discovered lymph nodes with necrotised tissue in the donor's kidneys. "When I heard, the operation was unfortunately almost finished," he told the press.