Life expectancy for heart transplant patients

The surgical-style mask covering Oviedo coach Tom Hammontree’s mouth and nose fogs his glasses as he breathes.

“It’s just something you have to put up with,” Walter Dahn said.

Dahn understands. Hammontree, a track and field and cross country coach at Oviedo, and Dahn are part of a select group of Central Floridians who have had heart transplants.

Before their surgeries at Florida Hospital, home to the only heart-transplant program in the Sentinel coverage area, their lives were filled with a medicine cabinet of emotions and feelings — doubt, fear, hope, pain, exhaustion, wondering whether they would survive.

And now?

“What I feel now is the miracle of life,” said Hammontree, 68. “I have realized how amazing life is.”

Dahn, a music teacher at Spring Lake Elementary in Ocoee, also is 68 but refers to the date of his transplant — July 12, 2012 — as his second birthday.

“You are grateful that you have the opportunity to live,” Dahn said. “I am thankful to the donor’s family. It’s like I am living on extra time.”

They’re not the only ones. Since surgeons at Florida Hospital performed their first transplant, in January 2012, eight patients have received new hearts there. Before then, Shands in Gainesville, the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Tampa General Hospital and Jackson Memorial in Miami were the only facilities in Florida performing heart transplants.

About 2,000 heart transplants are performed each year in the United States at an average cost between $550,000 and $650,000, according to Florida Hospital statistics. The amount covered by insurance varies, depending on several factors.

Orlando Magic owner Rich DeVos had a heart transplant in 1997 in London.

“Not only have Mr. Dahn and Mr. Hammontree gained more years of life, but their quality of life now will be greatly improved from the life they had before they were transplanted,” said Dr. Hartmuth B. Bittner, who performed both surgeries. “Both patients will be able to return to relatively normal daily activities.”

Hammontree’s track athletes have noticed a difference in him since the surgery.

“He is a lot more energetic,” Oviedo senior Danielle Turk said. “He seems to have a lot more fight in him. It has given him more gumption to keep fighting.”

Said distance runner Adam Pfeifle: “It is great to see him back now. It is really inspiring.”

Hammontree returned to practice three weeks after the surgery, staying for a short time at first. Now he remains for the entirety of every practice.

The only thing he is supposed not to do is demonstrate to the athletes. Sometimes he does, though.

“My brain says I am ready to go, but my body says, ‘Wait a minute. You have been through a traumatic experience,'” said Hammontree, who takes 42 pills a day. “Your ribs have been cracked open. Everything inside has been moved around. It’s going to take a year to fully recover.”

For 13 years, Hammontree knew his heart was failing him. Diagnosed with idiopathic cardiomyopathy in 2000, his left chamber was functioning at about 15 percent. The right side of his heart was trying to compensate.

He spent more than two years attached to a pump that constantly sent primacor, a medicine, into his heart to keep him alive.

“He probably doesn’t realize how close to death he was,” Bittner said.

That pump failed during a track meet at Lake Highland last spring.

“All of a sudden, it started beeping,” Hammontree said. “It freaked me out. I couldn’t go without primacor for more than 15 minutes.

“Fortunately, Lake Highland Prep isn’t far from Florida Hospital. We got there, got a new pump and I went back to the meet.”

Dahn was feeling fine until he started experiencing shortness of breath. Walking 25 steps became exhausting. He had sustained a silent heart attack, which has no symptoms like chest pain.

Bittner said he probably had several, though he could not be sure how many or when they occurred.

His heart enlarged and only was functioning at 10 percent. He was placed on the transplant list and told that without a new heart, he had four months to a year to live.

“When I heard they were going to evaluate me for a transplant, at first you’re very down,” Dahn said. “You thank God that you have had a nice life.”

It is a life that will continue and be much better than before. The average life expectancy after a heart transplant is about 10 years, according to several medical websites.

“The last 1 1/2 years, I was in pain every day,” Hammontree said. “I hurt all the time. There was a time that I was so exhausted where I had to sit down. Now I feel great. I am tremendously different.

“Now I feel like I can do anything.”

Agencies