Allyson Gamble is thankful for every morning. Emily Roosevelt is proud to say she is 40. Navy veteran Michael Cox is humbled. And Joseph Talbert is happy he can ride his bike with friends.
All four recently received heart transplants through Utah's unique heart transplant program, which is observing its 25th anniversary this week.
"I can't believe she made it," 8-year-old Benjamin Gamble said of his mother at a news conference about the program.
He nearly didn't live himself, due to her heart failure.
Because a flu virus infected Allyson Gamble's heart while she was pregnant, doctors had to induce labor more than a month early, after her heart started to suffer. Then during labor, as her heart failed, a doctor had to yank Benjamin out with forceps so quickly that it fractured the baby's skull.
Her heart remained stable enough for four years, but then quickly deteriorated, and she received a transplant in 2007.
Benjamin's scar from the forceps is barely visible years later. But the family's life has changed forever.
"When you come through an experience like that -- you almost lose your spouse and your child as well," Jim Gamble said, pausing. "We feel very fortunate to wake up and look out the window and see the sun shine."
Allyson Gamble credits Utah's team approach for her survival. Called the UTAH (Utah Affiliated Transplant Hospitals) Cardiac Transplant Program, four hospitals work together to care for heart failure patients. The team includes University of Utah Hospitals and Clinics, Intermountain Medical Center, Primary Children's Medical Center and the George E. Wahlen Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center.
The program started in 1985 -- the recipient of the first heart lives in Wyoming -- and has performed 1,066 transplants.
Emily Roosevelt, born with a congenital heart defect that didn't cause any health problems until she was 38, considered relocating for a transplant. But she decided she could receive the best care in Utah.
The Park City woman thanked her donor family for their gift. "It's also such an incredible gift to my sons," she said, looking at 6-year-old Mason Foehl, wearing a black cowboy hat, and 3-year-old Liam Foehl.
Michael Cox was serving in the Navy in Iraq when he developed heart failure in 2005. He was sent home to Kansas to recover. But when his condition worsened in 2007, he was flown to Utah's VA center, one of five heart transplant centers in the VA system. "My heart has been the best gift I have ever received," he said.
Born with a heart defect, Joseph Talbert had three open-heart surgeries and received a pacemaker before he got a transplant in 2008. Three months after the transplant, he joined his Boy Scout troop on a 25-mile bike ride. Now 16, the Orem boy has started growing again, after a three-year stall. His family can now take hikes together.
Said his mother, Wendy Talbert: "It is a totally different life."
