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Sunday, August 3, 2008
Emory hits milestone
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The band was playing “Wooly Bully.” And Terry Green was on the dance floor, gettin’ down.
It was 1997. Green and his wife of 36 years, Danette, were on a cruise to the Bahamas. Suddenly, he seized up while cutting the rug. A pain, similar to a leg cramp, consumed the center of his chest. He immediately went to the ship’s infirmary.
At first there was doubt he’d suffered a heart attack. Indigestion, maybe, but not a heart attack. He didn’t have all the telltale signs: discomfort in one or both arms, the back, neck, jaw or stomach; nausea and light-headedness.
But an EKG showed a definite abnormality. Green was stabilized until the next morning, till the ship could dock. A Nassau ambulance service would take him to a hospital. Before that could happen, though, he went into cardiac arrest. Three times.
“The reason I know they had to shock me three times is because they bill you for each shock,” Green, 61, told me, laughing.
When he returned to Atlanta, his heart condition remained stabilized for many years. Then in the latter part of 2006, Green said the “perfect storm” struck again. One of his prescriptions was filled with the wrong medicine. He had had some dental work done and - though it was never proven - Green suspects that bacteria affected his heart.
He spent time at Eastside Hospital. His heart operated at bare minimum. The retired state employee and fifth-generation Gwinnettian eventually had a heart pump put in. Doctors adjusted medications. But in January 2008, he worsened.
“Even though I had a Super Bowl Party planned, they decided that I should go stay at Emory,” Green told me.
And that’s where he remained until he was released March 17. With a new heart, and a piece of history.
He’s “Mr. 500.”
Green is the 500th patient to receive a heart transplant at Emory University. His surgery took place on March 8.
In June, the hospital held a press conference to mark the milestone along with the 20th anniversary of its heart transplant program. In a video, Green is flanked by Dr. Sonjoy Laskar and J. David Vega, the surgical director.
Besides the 500 adult heart transplants, the Emory Clinic cardiothoracic surgeons have performed more than 200 pediatric heart transplants, according to hospital spokesman Lance Skelly.
Green was pleased to help the hospital celebrate the milestone, but found one aspect of it disheartening - that more transplants haven’t been done. Emory has a transplant waiting list of about 50 cardiac patients.
“My concept was that this was more frequent and common that what it is,” he said during the news conference.
Today, Green feels fine. He takes a “godly dose” of drugs - two immunosuppressants and medications for high blood pressure and cholesterol. He goes to Emory every now and again for check-ups and rehab work.
“It’s amazing,” he said. “I was so rundown with the old heart, and I got so much energy and vigor with the new heart. It’s amazing that it would make that much difference.”
As for being No. 500, well, Green is content.
But he would have been just as pleased to be No. 499 or No. 600.
Rick Badie’s column appears on Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Contact him at 770-263-3875 or e-mail: rbadie@ajc.com.
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