Here are some Cardiac Patient Stories from the Saint Barnabas
Health Care System.
Roger, of Passaic, NJ, was diagnosed with congestive
heart failure (CHF) at age 32. His two brothers died at young
age from heart disease and Mr. Thomas fought hard against
a similar fate. Yet, at age 54 he was admitted to the Heart
Failure Treatment and Transplant Program at the Saint Barnabas
Heart Center at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center with Class
IV heart failure. His cardiac output was declining, his pulmonary
pressures climbing and his symptoms of heart failure worsening.
Shortly after admission and prior to the identification of
a donor heart, his arrhythmias worsened. A few years
ago Mr. Thomas would have been among the hundreds of people
who die each year waiting for a heart transplant.
Today, the country’s most advanced cardiac centers
offer the latest generation of mechanical assist devices
which provide patients like Mr. Thomas a reliable bridge
to transplantation. Days after he consented to participate
in one of the Heart Center’s Left Ventricular Assist
Device (LVAD) clinical research trials and underwent device
implantation, a donor heart was found and a successful transplant
performed. Mr. Thomas continues to get stronger everyday
and says of Mark J. Zucker M.D., J.D.; Margarita Camacho,
M.D.; and the entire transplant team. “Wealth can’t
buy what they gave me. They saved my life.”
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