Mayo Clinic and Some Chicken

Back in March there was a cardiology conference at PCMC and Cooper's cardiologist was in charge of it. He invited an amazing, world renown surgeon to come be a part of this conference. The surgeon is Dr. Joseph Dearani of the Mayo Clinic. Lucky for us this surgeon is considered the leading expert for Ebstein's Anomaly. Our awesome cardiologist and Dr. Dearani reviewed Cooper's case together. Dr. Dearani said he felt that Cooper could have a very favorable repair and recommended we come to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota for him to perform the surgery in the next 6-12 months.

Well now it's over 6 months later and Cooper's oxygen saturations are very slowly dropping as he outgrows the BT shunt he had placed at 3 weeks old. We decided to act now with the encouragement of his cardiologist. So he is scheduled to have the Cone procedure (repair of the tricuspid valve), ASD repair (hole in-between his atriums, very common in Ebstein's kids), BT shunt removed, a portion of his heart removed to reduce its large size for his little body, and possibly the Glen procedure.

We are very fortunate to have health insurance and a great support system. However, even with these amazing blessings there is still a large cost to this procedure and all the travel/expenses for us to be there for 3 weeks. So this is where you can help us and help your belly during dinner time. We are going to be having a fundraiser at Chick-fil-a in Sugarhouse on September 4th from 5-8 PM. They will donate 10% of all their sales during that time to our trip to Mayo. We would love a great turnout because that would help reduce the stress of this whole experience.

We feel so blessed to live in a time where there is the ability to repair Cooper's heart and that we live in a country where we can easily do so. This procedure is fairly new, but has proven to have great results and we are excited for our little boy to have this procedure and all that it will mean to his future. Dr. Dearani is truly the best and we wouldn't want Cooper to have anything less than the best. The cardiothoracic surgeons as PCMC, who work miracles on little hearts every day, said, "Why would you have anyone else do this?" So we truly trust their opinions and are mostly excited to have this behind us.

If you are sick, please support us in spirit from home as we need to keep Cooper as healthy as possible before surgery. Thanks again for all the love and support! We are excited to eat chicken with you and can't wait to see your faces on September 4th.

Cooper post-op at 3 weeks old