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Woman's Heart Takes All By Surprise

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By GEOFF FOX

gfox@tampatrib.com

Published: December 7, 2008

WESLEY CHAPEL - Allison Kennedy is a medical mystery.

At 24, the registered nurse at Florida Hospital Zephyrhills is talkative, bursts into smiles when discussing her Nov. 1 wedding to Keith Sutton and has the endurance to keep up with 2-year-old son Connor, a 35-pound bundle of energy.

She has recovered well from quadruple bypass surgery, performed May 19 at Pepin Heart Hospital at University Community Hospital in Tampa. Two blood vessels leading to her heart were completely blocked and two others were nearly as bad.

Oddly, her cholesterol was only slightly higher than normal.

"The doctors have no clue what caused it," she said.

Kennedy was 23 when the operation was performed. She is not obese, has always been active and doesn't have a major family history of heart problems. She played soccer and took ballet lessons for years, and she played tennis at Harvest Christian Academy in Daytona Beach.

As an adult, she smoked about half a pack of cigarettes a day, but she also jogged and often bowled. She says she ate lots of fruits, vegetables and whole grains.

"She's still in her child-bearing years, when your estrogen levels can be protection for your heart, as well," said her mother, Debbie Kennedy. "You don't think it's a possibility at her age."

The May operation was performed by Scott Bronleewe of Cardiac Surgery Associates of Tampa, whom Kennedy sometimes works alongside in Zephyrhills. She turned to him for guidance after being frustrated by other doctors who didn't link occasional chest pain and numbness in her fingers to cardiac issues.

She told him about the time in September 2007, when she became short of breath and had chest pain after running to help a patient whose heart had stopped. She told him she sometimes struggled for more than a minute to catch her breath after climbing a flight of stairs.

She said she could make her fingers "get numb and tingly" through exertion.

'Didn't Sound Like Indigestion'

"It didn't sound like indigestion to me," Bronleewe said. "I think a couple of doctors didn't believe her, but I told her to put her foot down. But then, who's to believe her when you're looking at that patient?

"She's the same age as my daughter."

Tests were run by cardiologists Arlene Lobo and Roberto Medina at Heartcare Institute of Tampa on Bruce B. Downs Boulevard. The results were as baffling as they were troubling.

"They couldn't believe what they were coming back with," Debbie Kennedy said. "They said, 'She needs bypass surgery.' They did every diagnostic procedure they could for her because everyone was in such disbelief that someone her age was having that problem."

It is so rare for someone Kennedy's age to undergo a quadruple bypass that neither the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention nor the American Heart Association could provide statistics showing how often it happens. The average age of a bypass patient is 64.9 years, according to the Society for Thoracic Surgeons.

Bronleewe, who performed the four-hour operation two days after the diagnosis at Heartcare, doesn't need numbers to tell him how rare it is.

"I've never seen a female this young with this kind of coronary disease," he said. "It's extremely rare. I've been practicing almost 20 years and I've never seen anything like this. I've seen young men in their late 20s who smoke a lot and have bad genes, but never a young woman.

"She had very advanced coronary disease - to the point where my jaw dropped."

While there may never be a convenient time for major heart surgery, Kennedy was planning her wedding to Sutton, raising Connor, working full time and studying for a bachelor's degree in nursing at St. Petersburg College.

After receiving the diagnosis at Heartcare, she had about 48 hours to reconcile the situation, including the very real possibility that she could die in the operating room. The night before surgery, she held Connor in her hospital room.

"He was so innocent," she said. "I'm thinking, 'You have no idea what mommy will go through tomorrow.'"

Arduous, Humbling Recovery

Bronleewe said he hopes the four-hour procedure, which involved drilling holes in her heart with a laser, "will last her forever."

"But I would hope 15 to 20 years," he said. "By then, we could have some stem-cell research with a different way to treat coronary disease."

Despite pain she described as "out of control," Kennedy recovered well. While some bypass patients are on a ventilator for hours after surgery, she removed hers after 30 minutes. Soon, she was walking laps around the nurses' station, eager to return to her Meadow Pointe home.

She was home several days later, but described her recovery as arduous and humbling. She relied on others to bathe her and care for Connor, whom she couldn't lift. For a while, she was so weak she was forced to nap after brushing her teeth.

Eight weeks after the surgery, she was back at work in the intensive care unit in Zephyrhills.

Five months after the operation, her energy level is almost back to normal, Sutton said. The couple plans to honeymoon in Cozumel, Mexico.

"I'm still not up to where I was before," Kennedy said. "My flexibility has been reduced in my chest and sternum when I do certain things, like painting the house or moving. I'm the type of person who would lift the end of the couch, or huge boxes, and tote it away. But I don't want to risk it now.

"They opened my sternum and wired it back. I don't want to pop a cable or something."

Nowadays, she walks, swims and attempts to play tennis with Connor. She takes cholesterol-lowering medication and 325 mg of aspirin daily. She quit smoking.

As she spoke of her experience, Connor trotted in with a copy of Dr. Seuss' "Horton Hatches the Egg" in his outstretched hands. She hoisted him into her lap and began to read.

After a few pages, Connor was done.

Kennedy smiled as she watched him go.

She didn't finish Connor's story, but offered a moral to her own.

"Don't think you're invincible because you're 23."

Reporter Geoff Fox can be reached at (813) 779-4613.

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