When I was 19 months old, I had my first heart transplant as a result of Kawasaki disease. On February 17, 2005, I had my second as a result of coronary artery disease. I feel that more people should be more aware of what hearts transplants are, and what we as recipients have to go through in order to stay out of the hospital and alive.

What is a heart transplant?

When your heart is beyond repair by surgery or through other interventions, you obviously won't be able to survive. The solution to this problem is to get a new heart. Lately, robotic hearts have been developed, but they don't work quite as well as the actual organ. A donor will give their heart to the recipient, or person who needs the transplant.

Who is a donor?

A donor is a person who donates. In this case, they donate organs of the body. In a few cases, the donor may donate an organ, such as a kidney or lung lobe, and still survive. In a heart transplant, this is not the case.
My donor died of a surgery that went wrong. Besides her brain, every other organ was in perfect condition. She was able to many people. Use the Amy's Angels Organization link at the top to find out more. You can find more information on organ donation at the Gift of Hope link at the top, as well.

How do you receive a heart transplant?

In order to receive a transplant, you must be in critical need of one. Organ donation is not exactly a popular thing, and the available organs are scarce. A doctor or other official person will confirm that you do indeed need the transplant, and you will then be placed on a waiting list. Some people wait a week, where as others can wait for years. It depends on how critical your condition is. For example, if you are more likely to die than someone who was placed on the list a few months ago, then you will be placed before them.
Psychologists come and interview your family, friends, and other people to make sure that you have a good support group. If your support group seems weak and unsupportive of you, it is less likely that you will receive a transplant. Your age, heart size, and blood type also determine what type of heart you can receive.
When a heart becomes available, it is sent to your hospital as quickly as possible in an icy cooler. A heart can only stay on the ice for ten hours before it is useless. As it is coming, the family is notified, and the recipient is prepped for surgery. I won't go into the details of how the actual surgery takes place, but I will say that you are kept alive by machines when they remove your heart. They have to stitch in the new heart, attaching all the arteries, veins, and capillaries. After the surgery, it takes several weeks to recover.

What happens after the transplant?

If all goes well, for the first year or so, you will go to the closest heart transplant center at least once a month. There you will have blood levels drawn, have an echocardiogram and an ECG, called an EKG, and have a routine check up with your cardiologist. They are working on developing ways to avoid having organ recipients take numerous medications for the rest of their life, but it really isn't worth the risk. Many meds, like Prograf and Rapamycine, are anti-rejection meds that make the body accept the foreign organ. However, there are lots of meds that are mineral supplements, such as iron and potassium. You should have biopsies regularly. A biopsy is when they go through you leg or neck and take a small piece of your heart to see if it is rejecting and if it is working properly. You can choose to do these under anesthesia or not. I personally prefer to have them done under anesthesia.

What are some strange things that happen?

I have had just about every possible thing happen to me that could possibly happen. The weird thing is, transplant patients rarely ever experience chest pain as a result of these weird things happening to their heart. This is because the nerves are severed when they are inserting the new heart. I was in complete heart failure, and I felt perfectly normal! Well, as normal as I'll ever feel!

You could eventually need a second transplant, and there is a type of cancer that occurs in transplant people. This cancer is called Post-Transplant Lymphoproliferative Disease, also known as PTLD. They have often found that lowering anti rejection medication doses can make it go away, but in some rare cases, mine for example, chemotherapy is necessary. This cancer only shows up in about 9% of all transplant patients.

Coronary artery disease is another weird, but possible, thing that occurs in transplant patients. This causes your major arteries' cells to grow too large and multiply too much. This could cause clotting. I had one of my arteries 90% clogged! Luckily, they have a minor procedure that puts a small, wire tube, called a stent, into the artery to keep it open and prevent further clotting. I had this done, and now my arteries are working well. This only shows in about 10% of heart transplant patients.

Heart rejection is another possibility. Most of the time, they are able to fix the heart and raise the medication doses, preventing the need for another transplant. In my case, I was in the hospital for a few weeks while my body re-accepted the heart and recovered. Most of the things listed happen to a very minor percentage, but it is still a good idea to know about what could happen future.

The Nick and Nate story link above is about two twins who had the same rare disease as each other and both needed transplants. It's not very often that this happens, if ever! It's really a cool story, and you might enjoy it.

What are some of the main causes for needing a transplant?

There are many causes for needing a transplant. Coronary artery disease

Where can I find transplant hospitals?

There are very few cardiology centers that specialize in heart transplants. Below are a few links to great heart centers throughout the United States. These are all links for Children's hospitals, however, you can find local hospitals near or next to these that have excellent adult heart centers as well!

Primary Children's Medical Center - Salt Lake City, UT

Children's Memorial Hospital -  Chicago, IL

Morgan Stanley Children's Hospital of New York-Presbyterian - New York, NY

Arkansas Children's Hospital - Little Rock, AR

Texas Children's Hospital - Houston, TX

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Created: January 2007