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Newswise – Shortly after she was born, Laura Valentine turned blue.
The doctor quickly discovered the cause. The infant had only one ventricle (or lower chamber) rather than two.
In addition to this rare heart defect, Valentine also has a condition called Inversus, where the organs in the abdomen are placed in a mirror image or inverted image of normal anatomy.
These and other challenges led Valentine to undergo a dual organ transplant at Chicago Medical University last summer. Today, the age of 35 is thriving.
Valentine was later engaged, enrolled in the doctoral program, and as part of a charity event he climbed 94 stairs to the top of the famous Chicago skyscraper.
“I know it's a bit of a medical miracle and a unique case study,” she said. “If I can put myself there to help others learn how to treat patients like me, if I can help patients like me feel a sense of comfort because they've made it this far, I'm always going to do that.”
A life-saving introduction for organ transplantation
To survive her congenital heart disease (CHD) condition, Valentine underwent her first laparotomy (called Fontan surgery) before she was two years old.
As her circulation system was successfully rerouted to improve oxygenation, she was able to experience relatively normal (though closely monitored) childhood and young adulthood. Riding horses; attending university and graduate school as an education expert. And become a mother.
However, in July 2023, she began to feel “not quite right” and eventually went to a hospital with swelling and pain in her abdomen. The doctors discovered that she was experiencing quiet atrial fibrillation, an irregular heartbeat with no significant symptoms. This condition caused her to develop blood clots in multiple organs.
The medication and procedures helped her to escape from the immediate danger, but it brought great concerns to her. Her heart and liver had failed. She was introduced to Uchikago Medicine, where she met Varvan Jeevanandam, MD, director of the Heart and Vascular Center, and Michael Earing (MD), chief of the Pediatric Heart Disease Section.
Although they admitted her case was extremely difficult, they could bring in other experts to take on the challenge, perform imaging scans, build complex 3D models and come up with ways to make implantation feasible with Valentine's unorthodox organ placement and circulation systems.
February 13, 2024 – The day before Valentine's Day and National Donor's Day – She learns she is accepted into Uchicago Medicine's heart transplant program. Shortly afterwards, she checked into the hospital and began preparing.
Dedication to “habilitation” before transplant surgery
While waiting for the appropriate donor organs to be available, Valentine walked four miles daily through the hospital halls of Jeevanandum's allegedly claimed.
“It's a really difficult case where a lot of people don't take you, and when you find someone willing to deal with you, you do whatever he says,” Valentine said with a smile.
Jeevanandam and other members of her care team said her “prehabilitation,” consisting of her daily walks and physical therapy training, is essential to her successful transplant surgery and quick recovery.
“She was a young, active mother and had these goals and all the goals she wanted to return to after hospitalization,” said DPT, PT, PT, DPT, Uchicago Medicine, a patient physiotherapist for patients. “I didn't have to sell her about the benefits of working hard to build strength. She really knew so she wanted to do whatever we asked her.”
Valentine's young daughter visited regularly throughout the preparation and waiting process, playing ample charades and other games with cardiovascular staff, and began naming stuffed animals at home. She still has a huge plush taco named “Nurse Nicole”, and Valentine and some nurses still text messages daily scores of online puzzle games they played together.
Team approach to transplant surgery brings you victory
84 days later at the hospital, Valentine received the news that the appropriate organ donor had been found.
“After explaining her about the transplant situation, the first question she asked was, 'Can you still love me when you get a new heart?” Valentine said. “For in the heart of a child, love is synonymous with your true heart.
I told her: “No, I wouldn't love you. I'm going to love you now with two hearts.”
Using the 3D models they built, Jeevanandam, Earing, Pediatric Cardiologist Stephen Pophal, MD, and director of MD, liver, kidney and pancreatic transplants, Rolf Barth designed new connections painstakingly and plotted how new minds and livers would be placed.
“We need more than a team to care for these patients. We need a big city,” Jeevanandam said. “We called it the 'surgical twister team' because everyone was distorting themselves and bent backwards to make this surgery work. ”
Valentine spent almost 24 hours in the operating room, showing up with a new, fully functional heart and liver. She was kicked out of the hospital just 16 days later, happily returned to her family, and was fully recovered.
“I think what I admire most about Laura is her fearlessness. She is the strength to be considered,” said Angela Kilberg, a cardiac surgery nurse at RN. “She was stubborn and she really believed in herself and the team that took her to the other side!”
Go for extra miles
Less than six months after his transplant surgery, Jeevanandam cornered Valentine at a holiday party he was hosting.
“You're taking part in our team climbing stairs, right?” he said – the annual charity event where participants compete on 1,632 stairs at 875 North Michigan Avenue, formerly known as the John Hancock Center, to raise funds for lung disease, referring to Hustle Chicago.
Valentine told her to do it, so she “must be medically exempt” to try to race, and she trained hard, and after just two months she went on a full climb with her fiancé and a friend of Uchikago Medicine.
Currently, Valentine is training for a 5K race, which will be held a few days after the June transplant anniversary, raising funds and awareness for organ donation. Anne Nguyen, MD, medical director of the Heart Transplant Program, which provides Valentine's post-transplant care, has contacted other complex CHD patients awaiting their transplant and given them the opportunity to encourage them with her own experience.
“There are so many points along the way that you want to give up on the journey of porting and recovery, but I want people to know that even if you don't feel something is 'valuable' at the moment, it doesn't mean that it's overall unworthy,” Valentine said.
For photos and details, see the original article on the Uchicago Medicine website.
