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A new heart brings new hope

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Sethan Wilder’s cardiovascular issues began early in life and continued for many years until a heart transplant was his only option.

When Sethan Wilder heard the heart he had been waiting for was available, the range of emotions he’d been feeling in the months prior seemed to all come back at once.

“Not just the news that I was in need of a heart transplant, but that I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to have a heart transplant,” the 28-year-old said. “I can’t say the news made me happy or sad necessarily, if anything it made me eager to take on this new challenge and all that comes with it. Read the full story in Michigan Health.

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Opinion: Seven years after getting a heart transplant, I competed in the Transplant Games

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The games are really not about medals. They are about finding your tribe as a transplant recipient or living donor.

Calvet, Ph.D., is the CEO of Blue Tiger, vice president of Team Southern California on the Transplant Games of America board and author of “My Life in Stitches — Everything You Wanted to Know About Transplant But Were Afraid to Ask,” coming out in 2023. She lives in San Diego.

When Jeff Traegeser, interim president of the San Diego nonprofit Lifesharing, stood before the Transplant Games of America crowd during the opening ceremony at the San Diego Convention Center on July 29, he eloquently shared his thoughts. Read more in the San Diego Union-Tribune.

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Speed Bumps Are Inevitable on the Post-transplant Journey

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Columnist Sam Kirton is quick to respond to some concerning symptoms

While working on today’s column, I considered writing about my birthday on Oct. 4. Then, a topic came to me quite unexpectedly.

On Monday, Sept. 26, I had to go to the hospital. Since the pandemic began, I’ve been careful to avoid large crowds in enclosed spaces and to always wear a mask indoors. So I was quite surprised to learn I had pneumonia — a significant complication for a post-lung transplant patient. Read more in Pulmonary Fibrosis News.

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An Unexpected Tale of Friendship Amid Paired Organ Donation

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Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania’s Pavilion, she’d gazed at the Philadelphia skyline long enough, and decided to get out of bed and walk.

Three doors down, she popped into the room of her friend Dan Napoleon. He was glad to see her, and together they took selfies and live chatted with their kids’ soccer team, away at a tournament in Virginia. They wished each other well, and marveled once again at the unlikely miracle that had brought them both to the hospital’s transplant floor.
Read the full story from Penn Medicine News.

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She’s celebrating her 50th birthday and 9th anniversary of her heart transplant

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At 26, Melody Hickman of Raleigh, North Carolina, was crestfallen. A routine physical detected a problem with her mitral valve. Fixing it required open-heart surgery.

“I knew I would have to be on a heart-lung machine, and the idea of having the incision really bothered me,” she said, noting she often wore V-neck tops. “It was a lot to digest.”

The surgery and recovery went well. Then, 14 years later, the valve needed to be replaced again. That meant a second open-heart surgery. Read more from American Heart Association News.

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Father’s Life is Saved after Receiving Heart, Kidney and Liver Transplant

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Triple organ transplant is first in the nation to use three organs from a donor after circulatory death using innovative approach for organ recovery

Anthony Donatelli, age 40, has served in the U.S. Navy for 22 years. On February 14, 2022, he was wheeled into the operating room at UC San Diego Health; his body facing a different kind of combat. His kidney, heart and liver were failing, and he was about to receive three new organs.

“I didn’t have the option of dying. I had two children at home, a six and three-year-old,” said Donatelli. Read the full story from UC San Diego Health.

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Meet Colette Hurd, Northwestern’s 1st transplant recipient of organs that weren’t a match. An immunosuppression strategy is key to her success.

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It was 422 days at Northwestern Memorial Hospital.

That’s the length of Ashburn-area resident Colette Hurd’s stay due to her idiopathic pulmonary arterial hypertension, a condition that affects blood vessels in the lungs and the right side of the heart and causes the heart and lungs to weaken over time.
Read the full story in the Chicago Tribune.

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From Fitness to Failure – And Back

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One year post-transplant, Kristy Sidlar is once again running — and now also writing.

As a twentysomething fitness instructor, it was admittedly a little disconcerting for Kristy Sidlar when she passed out in front of a class she was teaching back in 1996. She initially chalked it up to not having eaten enough, but she was soon diagnosed with an arrhythmia, given some medication and told not to exercise so much. “That is the kiss of death – to tell that to someone who loves to exercise,” says Sidlar, who is now 53.

Three years passed and Sidlar, true to form, was training for a triathlon when she experienced another episode; she was riding her bike to the gym to swim and run, but she never made it there. Fortunately, another cyclist found her fading in and out of consciousness and called 911 (this was before the age of cell phones). Read the full story on CareDx.com.

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