At the bottom of every driver’s license is a serial number with a little red heart next to it signifying the holder is an organ donor. The space that heart appears is less than a sixteenth of an inch, but the impact is so powerful it can’t be measured.
Miracles can come in a variety of ways but for one local family, this Christmas miracle is simply being together because that wasn’t guaranteed as recent as a couple months ago. For Chad Metzler there really is no place like home after spending the better part of 60 days in Omaha at the University of Nebraska Medical Center followed by a stint at Madonna Rehabilitation Center.
Chad and wife Susan, both teachers with Susan in the Wayne school system and Chad in Wakefield are the parents of four including a sophomore at University of Nebraska with Jordan also a part of the Cornhuskers women’s track team. Kinslee will graduate from Wakefield High School next May and Matthew is a sophomore in Wakefield, the youngest, Myka is a fifth grader at Wayne Elementary.
In the latter stages of August Chad was throwing baseballs to Matthew for some batting practice. He said there was about 30 balls in the bucket he was throwing from and he got halfway through and had to stop and rest because of shortness of breath. “I was definitely fatigued and that really wasn’t the first time I felt that way” he said. “In fact, back in June I had taken Matthew into the doctor for an ailment and I had quite the coughing spell. The doctor said maybe he should be checking me out as well. We chuckled but I said go ahead. He gave me some meds and said to call back in a couple weeks if the cough persisted.”
Well, a couple weeks turned into a couple months when Chad checked back in to report the cough was still prevalent. The checkup eventually led to him being referred to a cardiologist in Norfolk which took place the week of Labor Day. This was after he had competed in Wayne Country Club’s annual club golf championships in August where he placed runner-up in the first flight in what ultimately turned out to be while he was in heart failure.
The appointments in Norfolk were scheduled for the day after Labor Day and again that Thursday the 4th of September for a heart echocardiogram. Chad was to have a heart catheter procedure done on the following Monday, but things took a turn when he passed out after getting on his feet. Heart rate was in the 150’s and he was in atrialfibrulation because of irregular heartbeat.
On September 9th he was taken to UNMC by ambulance where he received the heart catheter procedure and that’s when the outlook changed. “Dr. Burdorf came and told me my husband was very sick,” Susan said. “A normal aortic valve has three flaps, and an undiagnosed birth defect showed Chad had just two.” She said they put in a balloon pump and an LVAD (left ventricular assist device). If it was a blocked valve that caused the issue they would do surgery to repair the valve and then body would heal itself.
Susan said the surgery went well but following surgery things got worse. “He was still in organ failure at that point with kidneys failing and liver levels out of whack,” she said. “At that point they put him on an RVAD (right ventricular assist device) in addition to the LVAD. A person can function at home with a portable LVAD but not with an RVAD.
As the calendar approached October the time had come to decide if the next step would be a heart transplant. For that to come to fruition however, there was several tests that had to be completed to see if Chad could even be placed on the donor register. That took several days to complete. He was placed on the donor registry has a 1A candidate which means he would be first in line. It didn’t even take 24 hours, and a heart was retrieved that would be placed in Chad to replace the sick, damaged one he carried for 54 years.
Chad said he was surprised when the doctor said he had turned away two hearts before picking the one he wanted for him. “He said he wanted to find as close to a match because I was younger than most of the transplant recipients. I also became number 626 which represented the number of heart transplants that had been done at the Med Center. Since I got mine and the time, I got home that number had increased to 628.”
Also surprising to Chad was went Dr. Um said he found a heart, but he wanted to know if he wanted it. “I really wasn’t sure why he asked that and I kind of froze. Susan had just left the room to take a walk, and I had other medical staff in my room. I looked toward the door and recognized one of the nurses who had been working with me, and he was nodding his head and so I said yes, I want it.”
The surgery took place on Friday, October 10th, which was also Susan’s birthday. In fact, Chad celebrated his 54th birthday while in the hospital on the day they put the LVAD in. “The actual heart transplant lasted less time than when they put in the LVAD,” Susan added. “It was amazing. He got back to his room around 3 p.m. and that evening he was awakened by the nurse. The following morning, they took his breathing tube out.”
He spent the next 18 days at UNMC before being transferred to Madonna where he underwent physical therapy to strengthen his muscles after being bedridden for a couple months. “I had nearly four hours of therapy each day for two weeks before I got to come home on Thursday, Nov. 13th Chad said. “I will start cardiac rehab in Wayne after the first of the year.”
The Metzler’s were advised to avoid big crowds for the next 3-6 months because Chad is still immune compromised. “I remembered my surgeon Dr. Um telling me when I am feeling good that I’m not so good yet,” he said. “He also said I will be amazed how good I feel next spring.”
Having been found to have a birth defect with the aortic valve it was suggested the Metzler children along with Chad’s siblings all be tested and according to Susan they have been.
Is it a Christmas miracle for the Metzler’s? It’s hard to argue against it. One thing is for sure with Chad and his family, the beat goes on…..
