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ALAN MURRAY/Standard-Examiner
Bambi Thomas, 24, of Roy lies in bed in her room at LDS Hospital in Sale Lake City in late April. Thomas died Wednesday after eight months of battling cardiomyopathy.
Transplant candidate dies
24-year-old Roy resident was region's only portable-heart-pump user
Thr, Aug 21, 2003
By MARIE GRIFFIN
Standard-Examiner staff
ROY -- A 24-year-old woman waiting for a heart transplant -- the only person in the Intermountain West on a portable heart pump -- died Wednesday after an aneurysm ruptured in the vessels that led to her brain.
Bambi Thomas of Roy needed a new heart when her own failed after she gave birth to a baby girl last Christmas Eve.
In April, the Standard-Examiner reported on her condition, postpartum cardiomyopathy, and her progress in the organ donation process.
The disease constitutes a weakened heart that is unable to pump blood effectively. It usually occurs in a mother within the first few months after she gives birth. Thomas" use of the portable pump made her a higher priority in the organ donation world.
She waited for almost eight months, pushing her suitcaselike pump around for most of that time.
"She was disappointed that she hadn"t gotten a heart," Thomas" mother, Terrie Chugg, said.
Thomas had a headache Tuesday that got so bad she couldn"t walk. She went to the hospital and had surgery at about 10 p.m. for the ruptured aneurysm.
The aneurysm"s cause has not yet been identified, said Jess Gomez, director of media relations for LDS Hospital.
"There was just so much brain damage" -- about one-fourth of her brain, Chugg said. "I thought, "I don"t think she can go through another fight." "
The mother said she told her daughter before surgery it was OK to let go if she couldn"t hold on.
Thomas died just after noon Wednesday. Her heart kept beating for 1 1/2 hours after she was taken off life support.
Chugg said she feels at peace and hopes Thomas" family -- her husband, Danny, her daughter, Ellie, her two siblings, father and family-in-law -- will get through the trial.
"We do believe in life after death. We believe in eternity," she said.
Copyright ©2003, Ogden Publishing Corporation
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