Heart Transplant Recipient Among Record-Breaking Class

CEDARVILLE, Ohio, Aug. 21, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Cedarville University welcomed a record-breaking freshman class this week as more than 1,000 freshman and transfer students started their 1,000 days at Cedarville. Last year's record freshman enrollment was 911.   

And for one family in particular, thanks were given for an achievement that seemed beyond comprehension nearly 18 years ago.

Lauryn Gibson, 18, of Greenfield, Ohio, received a heart transplant when she was three days shy of her first birthday. Her mom, Heather, noticed labored breathing in baby Lauryn at age 6 weeks. On a visit to her pediatrician's office, what was first thought to be the flu was quickly diagnosed as congestive heart failure. Lauryn was dying.

The pediatrician told Heather to immediately take Lauryn to Clinton Memorial Hospital in Wilmington, where an emergency helicopter would meet them for transport to Cincinnati Children's Hospital. Lauryn's father, Chet, a recently retired Highland County Sheriff's Deputy, came by car to Cincinnati.

"While we were in the helicopter, Lauryn's heart stopped beating," Heather explained. "The pilot turned off the intercom so I couldn't hear the medical staff talking, and then he began talking with me about what we'd experience when we landed, the sea of people who would be waiting for us, and to try and remain calm. He was phenomenal."

The medical staff revived Lauryn, but she was quickly put on life support. Her heart function was 8%, and the head of cardiology politely but frankly explained that the only way Lauryn would be able to leave the hospital was with a new heart.

"I said, 'I'm not going home without her,'" Heather said. "He told me, 'We're going to have to put her on the transplant list,' and I said, 'My God is bigger.'"

The cardiologist sat down with Heather and Chet and talked about Lauryn's future with a new heart, what life would look like. "And then she started getting better," Heather said. "Her heart function went to 13%, then 15%, and then we're thinking, 'Wait a minute.' Two weeks later, the doctor was saying, 'I don't know how you're going home.' On paper, she looked terrible, but she was defying the odds."

Lauryn was eating, sleeping and being a fairly normal baby. Her maximum heart function plateaued at 18%, but she was healthy enough to be released from the hospital.

Lauryn received the heart transplant 278 days after she was placed on the transplant list.

Though life started quite traumatically, she has lived, for the most part, a fairly healthy, happy life. She is a sister to one older brother and two younger sisters. She was a cheerleader at McClain High School, and she enjoys riding horses.

She will enter Cedarville as a junior because she took dual-credit college classes her last three years at Greenfield. She will begin classes as a third-year prepharmacy major. She hopes to earn her Doctor of Pharmacy degree by 2023.

As for mom, it will be a tough transition, harder in certain ways than it is for most parents.

"It's really hard," Heather affirmed. "Just relinquishing control over things that we've controlled for so long, like her medicines and her environment. I've spent a lot of time teaching her how to advocate for herself, and you hope that you've done those things well. There's a lot more at stake, and it could cost her life, like being compliant with her meds and following through with what her doctors have to say."

Even with these concerns, Lauryn's choice of university has eased some of that trepidation. "We've just been really encouraged by the response of Cedarville," Heather said. "Lauryn was recruited by and accepted by other colleges, but Cedarville's biblical approach was huge for us. She made the right decision."

Located in southwest Ohio, Cedarville University is an accredited, Christ-centered, Baptist institution with an enrollment of 4,193 undergraduate, graduate and online students in more than 150 areas of study. For more information about the University, visit www.cedarville.edu.

SOURCE Cedarville University

Related Links

http://www.cedarville.edu