With his heart failing from a deadly viral infection, Kansas high school football player Tyler Groom waited nervously inside an Oklahoma City hospital's operating room.
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He was to get two cardiac-assist devices that could keep him alive for a short time longer.
But on Aug. 19, just as Integris Baptist Medical Center physician Dr. James Long brought a scalpel to Groom's chest to make the incision, the operating room doors flew open.
Transplant cardiologist Dr. Doug Horstmanshoff burst in. A donor heart had been located.
Groom, 17, along with friends and relatives and Baptist transplant doctors, discussed the remarkable timing at a news conference Friday. They used words such as "miracle,” "miraculous” and "in God's hands.”
Long said the timing "turned a tragedy into a triumph.”
"There's no doubt this was the work of a higher power,” said Horstmanshof. "The way everything just fell into place was too perfect, even for modern medicine.”
Groom's surgery originally was scheduled to start at 8 a.m. but was moved to 9:30 a.m.
Had the surgery occurred at 8 a.m., Groom temporarily would have been taken off the transplant list until his body could heal from the trauma. He would have missed his chance to receive a heart, Long said.
This summer, Groom was looking forward to his 17th birthday and his senior year of high school in Winfield, where he plays middle linebacker on the Vikings varsity football team.
Physicians said he was the picture of health until a sudden virus threatened his life. He could no longer eat or drink, and he was vomiting at least three times a day because of severe heart failure.
On Aug. 5, he was flown from a Kansas hospital to Integris Baptist. He was put on the transplant list on Aug. 7.
"That was a tough day,” said Tyler's father, Alan Groom.”
He was scheduled for surgery to receive two ventricular assist devices, known as a bi-VAD. One device would control the left side of his heart, the other the right.
"My husband and I had accepted the fact that Tyler needed these devices,” said Tyler's mother, Tammy. "But our other son, Luke, Tyler's older brother, kept holding out hope. He told Tyler before the surgery: ‘I pray you go to sleep expecting a bi-VAD, but wake up with a heart.'”
That prayer was answered.
Integris cardiovascular surgeon Dr. Craig Elkins performed the transplant and said the donor heart fit perfectly.
"We didn't have to make any modifications or adjustments,” he said. "It was as if the new heart was meant for Tyler's body.”
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Tyler Groom, 17, a heart transplant recipient, with his parents, Alan and Tammy Groom, at Integris Baptist Medical Center. By Steve Gooch, The Oklahoman
Saving a life
•Tyler Groom was diagnosed with dilated cardiomyopathy. The source of the life-threatening disease wasn't found.
•The first heart transplant performed in Oklahoma was by Dr. Nazih Zuhdi at Integris Baptist Medical Center in 1985.
•Groom's was the 417th heart transplant at Integris Baptist.
•To learn more about Groom's journey, go to www.caringbridge.org/visit/tylergroom.
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Good luck Tyler, and always remember what a precious gift you have beating in your chest!!