Maria is doing well and grateful for a second chance at life.
Maria Akhlatkina, 42, is a mother of three – ages 19, 12 and 9. A former flying acrobat with Cirque du Soleil, she is used to physical challenges. And she faced one of the biggest ones of her life on April 23.
She awoke to what she presumed would be a routine day of preparing for her interior design work and getting the children off to school. By 9:30 am, she was nauseous and vomiting. "The last thing I remember was telling my co-workers to call 911," she said.
When she arrived by ambulance at Holy Cross Hospital, she was unconscious and rapidly deteriorating. She was in cardiogenic shock. Emergency Department physician John Beach called the cardiac team to keep a watchful eye on her. Alex Llanos, MD, a structural heart disease specialist, was first to arrive from the heart team.
A bedside ultrasound revealed severe weakness of the heart muscle. Enter Elias Collado, MD, a heart failure specialist, who decided to put the transplant center on notice. Holy Cross Hospital is part of a Super Clinically Integrated Network (CIN) with Memorial Physician Partners called Atlantic Coast Health Network. Holy Cross has a partnership with Memorial that facilitates the transfer of patients who may need a heart transplant. Although a transplant ultimately was not needed, it is best not to wait too long to make that call. The team had no way of knowing at the time whether she might need one.
"The sooner you jump on this, the better the outcome," explains Dr. Llanos.
Maria was transported to the Cath Lab. An Impella device was inserted to support her heart. She still was not doing as well as expected. Next step: ECMO with cardiothoracic surgeon Alexander Justicz, MD.
ECMO replaces the function of the heart or supplements the function of the heart and lungs when patients are struggling to get oxygen into the blood stream. Maria was transferred to Memorial Healthcare, where she woke up two weeks later after having a valve replacement.
"We are a cardiovascular program that is open to elevating patient care through collaboration," said Dr. Llanos. "Better patient care is our ultimate goal."
Today, Maria is doing well and grateful for a second chance at life—as is her husband Mick.
"The team at Holy Cross worked together, rigorously to save my wife's life," Mick said. "With that said it was in a controlled, calm environment. When you are in this situation, everything runs through you mind. How can someone so young, fit & healthy, be in this position. How is this going to turn out? Dr Llanos and his team, not forgetting the miracle doctors and staff of the ER and Cardiac unit, constantly informed me of my wife's progress.
After my wife came back from the Cath Lab, the Holy Cross Team approach me to suggest a transfer to Memorial Hospital. The severity off my wife's condition was not looking good. But again, with their professionalism and family oriented conversation, explained to me, this move will give Maria a greater chance of survival.
Looking back at this dreadful situation, I could never of imagined, two businesses working together. Now I look at it as two health caring companies pairing up to save lives.
We went back to visit the teams 3 weeks after leaving memorial. It gave us great satisfaction, knowing we could say thank you to the hard working men and women at Holy Cross. A thank you, you remember for a while, the smiles on the faces of all the doctors and team members we saw, we will never forget."