A RACE FOR LIFE; TRANSPLANT TEAM'S RUSH TO SPOKANE AND BACK IS ALL IN A LONG DAY'S WORK; LIFESAVERS WITH HEART.Byline: Jesse Hiestand Staff Writer SPOKANE, Wash. - From the moment surgeons cut open the chest of a 44-year-old man at UCLA Medical Center UCLA Medical Center is a hospital located on the campus of the University of California, Los Angeles in Los Angeles, California. It is rated as one of the top three hospitals in the United States and is the top hospital on the West Coast according to US News & World Report. , they had less than eight hours to transplant his new heart - only it was now stranded in a snowstorm some 800 miles away. The carefully choreographed race to pick up the heart had stalled last week on an icy runway in Spokane, Wash., where surgeons had just flown from Van Nuys Airport Van Nuys Airport (IATA: VNY, ICAO: KVNY, FAA LID: VNY) is a public airport located in Van Nuys, California in the San Fernando Valley, within the Los Angeles city limits. , a Southern California Southern California, also colloquially known as SoCal, is the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. Centered on the cities of Los Angeles and San Diego, Southern California is home to nearly 24 million people and is the nation's second most populated region, hub for transplant flights. The crew sent to de-ice the Learjet was more than an hour behind schedule, making the transplant team ever more anxious. ``The clock has just begun for the recipient,'' said surgeon Anne Sykes, minutes after removing the heart from a man who had died at the Deaconess dea·con·ess n. 1. A Protestant woman who assists the minister in various functions. 2. Used as a title prefixed to the surname of such a woman: Deaconess Brown. Noun 1. Medical Center in Spokane. ``You feel like 30 seconds can make a difference.'' Shortly before midnight, with almost no time to spare, the heart was delivered to UCLA UCLA University of California at Los Angeles UCLA University Center for Learning Assistance (Illinois State University) UCLA University of Carrollton, TX and Lower Addison, TX for a successful transplant that left the patient resting in stable condition. As with all such mercy flights, it was another life-or-death rush for Sykes and pilot Max Falahati, who flew out of Van Nuys Airport for UCLA, the busiest heart-transplant center in the nation. Each time, there is no guarantee the heart will arrive on time from points as far away as Georgia and Alaska. ``What if we got killed en route?'' Sykes pondered. ``The recipient would be at a loss, with their chest open. They don't have the ability to recover without their new heart.'' The jet, chartered through Clay Lacy Aviation, would typically fly business executives, Hollywood stars and other high rollers High Rollers was an American television game show which aired on the NBC network from July 1, 1974 to June 11, 1976 and again from April 24, 1978 to June 20, 1980. Two different syndicated versions were also produced, the first a weekly series from September 8, 1975 to . That evening it was a flight of life. Each year, Lacy's crews dispatch about 120 jets to pick up organs or patients, in some cases doing both at the same time using two different planes. ``There's no way some of these organs could be brought here if we didn't have these planes,'' said Dr. Daniel Marelli, who performed the transplant. The man's identity was withheld for privacy reasons. ``The farther out farther out Of or relating to an option contract with a later expiration date than a contract that is currently owned or being considered. For example, a contract with a May expiration date is farther out than a contract with a February expiration date of you go the more critical it becomes because of limits on preservation,'' said Marelli, director of organ retrieval for the University of California, Los Angeles UCLA comprises the College of Letters and Science (the primary undergraduate college), seven professional schools, and five professional Health Science schools. Since 2001, UCLA has enrolled over 33,000 total students, and that number is steadily rising. , Heart and Lung Transplant lung transplant Surgery Transplant of a lung allograft into a Pt with failing lungs; 90 US centers perform LT; 35 centers perform ≥ 10/yr Mean wait time 18 months Indications COPD–eg, emphysema due to α1 Program. The flight cost about $4,800, a fraction of the overall cost of a heart transplant heart transplant Procedure to remove a diseased heart and replace it with a healthy one from a legally dead donor. The first was performed in 1967 by Christiaan Barnard. , which averages nearly $150,000. Dubbed ``lifeguard'' flights, these jets get priority takeoff and landing over all other flights except those in distress and are exempt from nighttime curfew rules on noisy jets out of Van Nuys Airport. ``Most of the calls are in the middle of the night because the operating rooms in these hospitals are usually booked in the day,'' said transplant preservationist pres·er·va·tion·ist n. One who advocates preservation, especially of natural areas, historical sites, or endangered species. pres Azie Alikhani. People undergoing the procedure have an 80 percent chance of surviving for five years, compared with just one or two years without it, Marelli said. The national United Network for Organ Sharing United Network for Organ Sharing See UNOS. has some 66,000 people waiting for heart, lung, kidney and other transplants, although only about one in four get them due to shortages, experts said. Owing to owing to prep. Because of; on account of: I couldn't attend, owing to illness. owing to prep → debido a, por causa de the need for transplantable organs, many doctors find they must go hundreds of miles in just hours to get the organs. Sykes, 35, has alone procured about 60 hearts in the first six months of her fellowship, including one last Sunday in Hawaii. The hopeful patients wait for a regional organ procurement group to match them with a donor who has been declared brain-dead - kept alive only on a ventilator - and has similar blood type, organ size and other physical characteristics. WAITING FOR A HEART When a match for the heart patient was found last Tuesday, it sparked a flurry of calls between UCLA and Spokane. For Sykes, it would be her third operation of the day, after a 5:30 a.m. heart procurement at Los Angeles County-USC Medical Center Los Angeles County-USC Medical Center (also known as County USC) is an 800-bed teaching hospital located in East Los Angeles in the Boyle Heights neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. and an operation to repair a hole in the heart of a 3-year-old girl. By 3:50 p.m., Sykes, Alikhani and third-year medical student Stacy Thurber arrived at Van Nuys Airport from Westwood and boarded the five-seat Learjet 24 with their iced-filled cooler. Six minutes after the hatch was sealed, the jet shot into the air like a bullet, Falahati and co-pilot Melad Herfeh sharing the cramped cockpit. ``Time won't wait,'' Falahati said. ``There's no other way to do it - the organs only keep so long.'' Banking over the San Fernando Valley San Fernando Valley Valley, southern California, U.S. Northwest of central Los Angeles, the valley is bounded by the San Gabriel, Santa Susana, and Santa Monica mountains and the Simi Hills. , relaxed in surgical scrubs surgical scrubs Cotton or cotton/polyester wearing apparel consisting of a short-sleeved shirt and drawstring pants, is the universal uniform of those daring men and women of action, the surgeons, often faded Kelly green. Cf Whites. and snacking on chips, Sykes quizzed her student on the procedure they would undertake in little more than two hours. An hour into the flight, Sykes caught a catnap, laying aside a textbook on thoracic and cardiovascular surgery cardiovascular surgery Heart surgery An operation for repairing structural defects of the cardiovascular system Examples CABG, repair of congenital heart defects, varicose veins, aortic aneurysms, ventricular remodeling, transmyocardial , which she said demands never-ending study. Moments before landing, Falahati's voice filled the cabin: ``It's snowing in Spokane,'' he warmed the team, just before hitting strong turbulence that tossed the jet like a kite in the wind. The Learjet descended through fog, setting down on the snow-caked runway of Spokane International Airport Spokane International Airport (IATA: GEG, ICAO: KGEG, FAA LID: GEG) is a public airport located five miles (8 km) southwest of the central business district of Spokane, a city in Spokane County, Washington, United States. at 6:01 p.m. A slow, seven-mile drive on icy freeways brought the team at 6:30 p.m. to Deaconess, where they joined other doctors already removing the donor's liver. A RACE FOR LIFE Ninety minutes later the UCLA doctors emerged with the heart steeped in a preserving solution and chilled on ice. ``Everything was going so quick I was just trying to keep up,'' said Thurber, the student. ``I've seen transplants done before but it was just an organ in the ice box. Now I've seen what it took to get there.'' The mission hit its first and only glitch A temporary or random hardware malfunction. It is possible that a bug in a program may cause the hardware to appear as if it had a glitch in it and vice versa. At times it can be extremely difficult to determine whether a problem lies within the hardware or the software. See glitch attack. on return to the airport, with the delay in de-icing. ``If this were just another flight then OK, but this is a heart transplant,'' Alikhani said. ``We just can't be sitting here twiddling our thumbs.'' Sykes and Falahati huddled on the snowy tarmac, searching through the fog for the truck that would clear ice from the wings of the Learjet set to whisk the heart back to Van Nuys. Pressure from ground crew quickly brought the de-icing truck. Twenty minutes late, the jet tore down the runway at 8:49 p.m., the heart team eating its dinner from foam takeout cartons. The cooler and its tender cargo rested in a cargo space behind them. The jet landed back at Van Nuys Airport at 10:54 p.m., where helicopter pilot Wendy Peterson waited in a Bell Long Ranger. Peterson ferried the cooler through the fog of the Sepulveda Pass, delivering the heart team to Operating Room 22 by 11:20 p.m. Five hours later, the man's new heart twitched its first beat. He remains in stable condition in a recovery that could stretch up to three months. ``Every time, it's like you've never done it before because each moment is so critical,'' Sykes said. ``Even if you've been up for days you have no sense of fatigue whatsoever.'' CAPTION(S): 5 photos Photo: (1 -- 2 -- color) UCLA transplant preservationist Azie Alikhani, at left, watches the San Fernando Valley disappear below on a flight to Washington to harvest a heart. Above, members of a transplant team carry the chilled heart to the operating room. David Sprague/Staff Photographer (3 -- color) THE FLIGHT Anne Sykes, left, catches a nap during the flight to Spokane, Wash., while third-year medical student Stacy Thurber brushes up on the fine points of preserving human hearts for transplant. David Sprague/Staff Photographer (4 -- color) THE CRITICAL DELAY IN SPOKANE Surgeon Anne Sykes reacts to bad news from pilot Max Falahati, who just informed her that the de-icing truck would be late. (5 -- color) THE RUSH FROM VAN NUYS Azie Alikhani, left, gets help from workers at Van Nuys Airport taking the heart to a waiting helicopter for the final leg of the trip. |
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