(somber guitar music) - [Mark] Yeah. Yeah.
Oh, look who's coming!
Jake Revere. - Mm-hmm.
- October 10th, 2020,
my youngest son Wesley got married to Peru,
so we're over there just doing everything and feeling great.
Running to get stuff. Everything was fine.
Three o'clock in the morning,
I got up to go to the bathroom.
Annetta was sleeping and I couldn't catch my breath.
I couldn't catch my breath.
I've never been in the hospital.
I've never gone to the hospital.
And I woke her up and said,
"Annetta, I have to go to the hospital.
I can't catch my breath."
So I'm in the local hospital,
I've been visiting with the lad people.
What's my echo showing, like 50?
And it was quiet.
And he goes,
"No sir, it's less than 20."
Well, I'm in orthopedics,
So, I don't know a lot about cardiology,
but I knew that wasn't good.
(indistinct chatter)
Late December, I heard some words,
that you never want to hear from your doctor.
He said, "Mark, there's nothing else I can do for you.
I'm going to have to send you to a higher level of care
at Ochsner."
I just couldn't believe that this was happening to me.
- There are several different types of heart failure
and in Mr. Nelson's case, specifically,
he had something called dilated cardiomyopathy,
where the left side of his heart
was not able to pump efficiently and at normal percentage.
And so over time,
even though he may not had the most obvious symptoms,
he slowly started to gain weight
and it was weight that was not related to eating food.
It ended up being water weight,
which can be one of the presenting symptoms
of heart failure.
- Heart failure is a very silent disease.
It creeps onto our patients.
And slowly and slowly when it comes,
it makes the patients adjust to this new lifestyle.
When we dug deeper into his case,
we found that Mark used to be a very active individual.
He was a physician assistant in the orthopedics,
moving and managing heavy equipment.
So, he was a well-built guy.
But when I saw him, he was extremely short of breath.
He could not even complete his sentences.
His lab showed that he was heading towards
a multi-organ failure
and is currently battling for his own life.
- One of the main things that we do to try to treat that
is to get that fluid back off again.
We also use medicines that effectively drop blood pressure
to take the pressure off the heart
to see if that left-sided pump can pump better.
And when those things don't work
is when we talk about a heart transplant and or an LVAD.
- She said, "Your heart's going down fast.
You had a rough weekend.
I know how you went into those arrhythmias
and don't know how long it's gonna stay strong enough
for to even go through any type surgery."
And I got back in bed and I said, "Annetta."
I said, "It's not getting better."
I said, "I don't know what to say."
She goes, "Listen, we're not giving up.
We're gonna hang in here and be as strong as we can
for as long as we can."
I said, "Okay."
- Ochsner has built a reputation
and has been in the forefront of advanced options
for a very long period of time.
- Here in New Orleans,
Ochsner is the only major your medical center
that does offer heart transplant
and left ventricular assist devices.
And because of that,
we play a really important role in the heart failure care
of our community here in Louisiana and the Gulf South.
- At 10 o'clock in the morning,
Dr. Desai came back in the room
with her whole entourage people,
and she said, in these words, I'll never forget.
She said, "Mr. Nelson.
We have a heart for you and it's a perfect match."
Right about 11 o'clock in the morning,
the OR crew came to get me and I got on that gurney
and I said, "I want to tell y'all something right now.
I appreciate all that you're about to do for me.
You know, I may never see you again,
I wanna thank you right now."
And so I laid back down and he gave me the juice
and that was that.
Then Dr. Spindel did his magic.
- Brought him to the operating room.
We put him on the heart and long machine
and then we took out his old heart and then took out that
temporary left ventricular assist device
and then we put a new heart in.
Then he had a fantastic post-operative course
and he went home, soon afterwards.
- You know, I saw him for three days, post-oping,
he's like, "I'm handing you over to the cardiologist."
But I mean, I just never got to really say thank you.
- All right. - Thank you.
You guys did the work.
- We're all appreciative of your whole family.
And a lot of the work actually gets done
with our coordinator. - Oh, I know. I know.
They're family. - That actually
make this a success. - Oh.
- [Dr. Bansal] We are there only for a small portion,
but they are gonna be your family for the rest of your life.
- Oh, I understand. I understand.
I've never smoked. I haven't been overweight.
I've done everything I'm supposed to do,
but you know what?
That's not how it goes.
And I've learned that there's not always an answer
why something happens to you.
I've told everybody,
I've kind of lost a word in my vocabulary.
I've lost the word me.
Now the things I do are for us.
I gotta represent this person
and I gotta represent their family.
I have a bigger responsibility now and I'm happy to do it.
It's an honor to be able to do that.
And so that's what I'm gonna do, every day.
I'm gonna show them that this was done for the right reason
and I'm gonna make them proud.
I'm gonna make them proud.