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So, what happened?
Bruce had a burst thoracic aortic aneurism on Thursday morning, 8/9/07. He was flown by Life Star to UMass Medical Center in Worcester, Mass where we waited 5 hours for a cardiac surgeon to become available. From 2:30pm-11:30pm, and on a heart/lung machine, one of the top cardiac surgeons in the country, Dr. S. Tam, fought to save his life. Bruce has a worse case scenario injury- a huge chunk of his aorta had ruptured, the heart valve was damaged, and the remainder of his artery had dissected. (For those of you non-medical folks-That is a REALLY bad thing to happen.) Dr. Tam only replaced a portion of the artery as Bruce was too unstable to endure any more than that. He remained in the O.R. until 4:00am with the surgical team trying to control his bleeding. Finally transported to CICU. - An hour later Bruce had a cardiac arrest and was taken back to surgery to remove a clot from his heart and to rework the Teflon mesh used to replace the removed portion of the aorta. The Dr. decided to leave Bruce's chest open because his lungs had become stiff during the lengthy surgery, and the likely possibility that they might need to get at his heart quickly. As of 8/13/07, Bruce is in the most critical condition one can be in and still be alive. He is getting the most immaculate care I have ever witnessed in a special "most critical patient" ICU room- He has 2 RN's assigned to just him. He has no less than 30 IV lines running, a ventilator and 6 other machines-Every imaginable body function is monitored constantly and they are on top of every detail, which has brought him this far.
Bruce was given a less than 50% chance of survival the minute the Life Star pilot landed: That was downgraded to 25% after the surgeon saw the degree of damage, but tonight his heart is still beating and he continues to cling to life. He has beaten the odds by living this long-His body is amazing in what it has endured these past few days. We flew Bruce's daughter and grandson in from Arizona on Thursday night. All of his family have been around him every minute and his Dr. has not left his side. (Dr. Tam was supposed to go on vacation Sat morning but didn't. ) All of Bruce's angels are working overtime: All those who love him, celebrate every hour that passes quietly. He is such a fighter and we hold on to the belief that he can and will recover from this. Keep him in your prayers.
His family will attempt to post updates on how Bruce is doing here in this section of the site as often as is possible, practical and necessary. You can communicate with Joyce at bruce.firth@verizon.net.
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