- Your Doctor must recommend that you be evaluated for a transplant. The recommendation included referral to Emory University Hospital in Atlanta, GA. It is one of the top Hospitals in the world for heart transplant surgery.
- Rachel was evaluated at Emory University Hospital for 4 days and was accepted as a candidate for heart transplant.
- You must then begin developing a financial strategy which includes a fund raising campaign. You must raise a certain amount of money before you can be put on the waiting list.
- You are then placed on the waiting list.
- You hopefully received your transplantation. An extensive Post-Transplantation plan is developed for you care.
- Estimated U. S. Average First Year Billed Charges for Heart Transplant
- Procurement ($74,400), Hospital ($240,500), Physician ($34,500), Evaluation ($20,000),
- Follow-Up ($81,600), Immunosuppressants (27,400), TOTAL ($478,900) These are just average figures for first year follow-up expenses and may not include all doctors.
- Rachel's current insurance pays 80% and she must pay the remaining 20% as well as co-payments and deductibles for all services including medications. She has not qualified for supplemental insurance due to her pre-existing condition.
Heart Transplant Cost
- The United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) coordinated the nation's organ transplant system. Based in Richmond, VA., UNOS is a private, non-profit membership organization.
- Manages the national transplant waiting list, matching donors to recipients 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, as needed.
- Monitors every organ match to ensure organ allocation policies are followed.
- Maintains the Database that contains all organ transplant data.
- Ensures that all patients have a fair chance at receiving the organ they need regardless of age, sex, ethnicity, religion, lifestyle or financial or social status.
- Keeps patients informed about transplant issues and policies.
- You must wait until a suitable donor heart (match) is available.
- You will be listed as a Status 1A, 1B or 2 patient on the heart transplant waiting listed based upon the urgency of your need.
- (When Rachel is first listed, because she of her condition and LVAD device, she will be listed as 1A for 30 days. After that she will be listed as 1B. There are other factors that could cause her to go back to 1A also.)
- When a donor heart becomes available a transplant coordinator will call you or page you.
- You must call back within 5 or 10 minutes. You must not be sick with fever, diarrhea or vomiting or you may not be able to have the transplant. It is important that you do everything possible to keep from getting an infection or virus.
- The first call may not always mean that transplantation will occur, that is why the call says there is a "potential" donor.
Donated organs require special methods of preservation to keep them healthy between procurement and transplantation. The length of time a donor heart organ can be kept outside the body is 4-6 hours.
- The surgeon examines each donor organ to ensure that it is strong and healthy. If the donor organ is not functioning well the transplant will not take place. This does not happen often, but it is a possibility.
- You must be able to leave your home within 15-30 minutes of the phone call in order to arrive at the hospital as soon as possible.
The Surgery
This very serious and complicated surgery contains too many complications to list.
- Suffice it to say, you will be on a breathing machine during and after the surgery.
- You will need a temporary Pace Maker.
- You will have many IV tubes, chest tubes, and a pulmonary catheter in your neck vein.
- You will be asleep 2-3 days before you wake up.
- Once waking up you will probably look different to your family. You will be pale, swollen and will feel cool to their touch. You may not remember their first visits.
- A typical stay in the ICU is four days. You will then be transferred to the cardiac surgery floor and if all goes well you will spend another 3-4 days before you are discharged.
- You will be on many medications for the rest of your life. Anti-rejection medications to prevent rejection of the donor organ; antibiotics and “anti hypertensive medications.. These medications MUST be taken exactly as prescribed and on time.
- The cost of medications usually totals approximately $2,000.00 per month. This is one of the reasons for fund raising, as this expense will be on-going.
- You must receive all follow-up care from Emory University Hospital and remain one year after transplantation to ensure you receive the proper care.
- You will need to have frequent biopsies to ensure that you are not having any organ rejection problems. This is usually done as an Out-Patient. It starts out as once per week for several weeks, then once per month, then per quarter or as often as recommended.
- Often a patient does not have any symptoms of organ rejection and that is the reason for the biopsies. If rejection does occur and it caught on time, it is treated with medications.
- There are some symptoms of rejection, but hopefully they will not occur before the biopsies could detect it.