
Shannon's Heart Transplant Fund
Donation protected
Hello everyone,
I'm starting this GoFundMe on behalf of my Dad, Shannon, in hopes you'll consider helping him and my family at this difficult time during this holiday season.
Shannon is a husband, father of four, and grandfather to three who all love him very much; personally along with being my Dad, I also consider him to be my best friend. He is the very foundation of our family and brings so much joy and laughter to our lives. In his free time he loves to play his guitar and listen to his music, along with spending time with all of us.
20 years ago Shannon had a major heart attack, one that is know as a widow maker; it's where major blockage occurs in the largest artery of the heart, making it so the blood stops flowing to the heart's left anterior descending artery (LAD) which provides 50% of the heart muscles blood supply. Only 12% of people survive this kind of heart attack, and fortunately Shannon was among the few who managed to. Not only that, but he also was able to recover from it and go on to live a normal life albeit with a weaker heart and a pacemaker/ICD for good measure.
At he beginning of this year he went into cardiac arrest twice; first on Christmas Eve (2022) where his Pacemaker/ICD was able to bring him back, but when it happened again on New Years Day it did not. Fortunately my younger brother preformed CPR on him and was able to resuscitate him, saving his life. Since then Shannon has been in and out of Utah's Intermountain hospital, where their heart failure team has been working closely with him and helping him recover.
Luckily he was able to get a new procedure where they utilize stereotactic radiotherapy to treat his refractory ventricular tachycardia; basically they used radiation to remove scar tissue from his heart instead of doing an invasive ablation. My Dad was the second person in the state of Utah to get this procedure actually, and was even in the news where they interviewed him and the doctors who preformed it! You can read more about it here: https://www.heraldextra.com/news/local/2023/mar/10/utah-man-gets-novel-treatment-for-heart-irregularity/
For awhile things were looking up after receiving that procedure, his heart even recovered to a point were doctors felt that the transplant was no longer necessary and stopped the process of him getting one. But my Dad started running into complications with his heart again on December 1st of this year, he's been in and out of the hospital at least 4 times since then with him currently being in the ICU.
During his time in the ICU the decision has been made between him and the doctors that the most viable option going forward is for him to receive a Heart Transplant. He is currently officially listed on the doners list and is a status 2, which means he will remain in the hospital indefinitely until the new heart is received and the procedure can be done.
Any of the money donated will go towards medical expenses, the cost of travel to and from the hospital, and help account for loss of wages as my Mom needs to take time off of work while my Dad is recovering.
If you're able to donate we appreciate it, any help at all would mean the world to our family right now.
Thank you.
Organizer
Jordan B
Organizer
Tooele, UT