NURSE: Wiggle your purple toes.
Say, there’s no place like home.
(LAUGH)
ROBERT: I was going to get a shirt made.
Says my mom is the strongest woman I know.
You know, so…I still have to get it made.
MARIA: My heart is only working 23% and it will only
get worse.
VINCENT: She couldn’t even walk from our house to
two houses away.
That was it.
She was finished.
I had to get a car to come pick us up and take us back home.
DR.
ADAMSON: Her chances of living for six months is very
low, maybe 10%.
She has a prognosis that is worse than pancreatic cancer.
MARIA: We’ve been married 39 years.
We met in high school.
VINCENT: Tenth grade.
As soon as I showed up she was the first one I saw.
I know it’s probably like a fairy tale but that’s how it happened.
God gave me a gift.
And that was her.
So, sorry…I’m always getting emotional.
KRISTI: Maria is the, you know, she’s the strong
one in the family.
I think she’s the center, the epicenter of their entire family, and I think that’s
true for a lot of women.
You know, they hold the families together.
DR.
MEHTA: When the heart fails, and the left ventricle
can’t pump blood forward anymore, a left ventricular assist device can be implanted
in order to take over for the heart.
SUZANNE: So this replaces the function of her left
ventricle.
The drive line comes across here, and goes to the external to get power into and out
of it.
DR.
MEHTA: We are entering the new area of mechanical
circulatory support with this new HeartMate III device.
DR.
ADAMSON: Now we don’t know today whether this will
actually perform like we hope it will.
And therefore the need for a clinical trial.
Turn your corners up.
We are the first center in the West to implant this device.
Look at this heart.
I mean, this is just a monster heart.
Drain the left atrium.
I’m going to do a PA Double Doppler.
She’s a pioneer.
The lessons that we will learn will be crucial for the next generation of heart-failure patients.
Boy, this looks nasty in here.
Nasty clot.
In this country, 500,000 people die a year and many of them, if they had more flow, they
could live normal lives.
Hold your lungs for a moment.
We will make a small hole in the very tip of her left ventricle.
And then we will sew this ring right onto the tip of the heart.
Keep the stitches coming.
If we just sew this to that to the heart with a running stitch…all right.
Give us the pump.
And put this pump right like that with this on the other side.
We’ll snap this pump to her ventricle to lock it there so the blood will come in here,
go through the pump, out there and then into the aorta.
We have to let this heart recover.
DR.
MEHTA: Once the pump is implanted, we can look at
the cardiac ultrasound to determine how the pump is actually working.
Whether the speeds are too high, too low, or in the right area.
DR.
ADAMSON: Turn your RPMs down to 4000.
At this point in time, the heart pump is in place.
Uh, it’s taken over her circulation beautifully.
The heart’s getting better by the minute.
OR NURSE: Hi Vincent, I’m in the OR with Maria right
now and everything is going smoothly.
The pump has been started, okay?
VINCENT: Okay, thank you.
OR NURSE: Okay, you’re welcome.
MARIA’S DAUGHTER: Good.
Mom’s a trooper.
She’s going to hang in there…right?
ROBERT: That’s what she said.
MARIA’S DAUGHTER: She’s going to get through it.
KRISTI: Maria…surgery’s all over.
You’re doing great, okay?
DR.
ADAMSON: Your heart was weak as a kitten.
The new pump is in and working beautifully.
You have more blood flow now than you’ve had in a long time.
KRISTI: We gave her a lifeline.
We offer hope.
It’s an amazing blessing to be in this position.
I’m going to take a listen to your new machine in here, okay?
SUZANNE: Maria’s a battery-operated woman at this
time.
DR.
MEHTA: If I can help them overcome their heart failure
so that they can get back to life that is the most fulfilling thing in the world.
If you so much as sneeze and don’t like the way it sounds, you give us a call.
You’re ours and we’re yours, whether you like it or not.
Don’t do anything crazy this weekend…I’m going to give you a hug.
KRISTI: She’s like an astronaut.
She’s going where a lot of people have not gone.
MARIA: We’re almost out.
VINCENT: Yeah.
MARIA: Time to go.
NURSE: Take care, Maria.
VINCENT: We have time.
We have time now.
I’m glad for that.
NURSE: Wiggle your purple toes.
Say, there’s no place like home.
(LAUGH)
MARIA: There’s no place like home.