PEORIA Everyone thought COVID-19 was the cause when 23-year-old John Wlodarchak ended up in OSF HealthCare Saint Francis Medical Center in April 2020 suffering from heart failure.
Wlodarchak, who lives in Mendota, had always been healthy. Just the week before he started having flu-like symptoms after he had run four miles, something he did regularly as a former high school cross-country runner. But COVID-19 was not the cause test after test came back negative for COVID-19 and other viruses that can damage the heart.
“We may never be able to prove what happened to John. The doctors all said it looked like COVID, but who knows, we may never know. The timing was pretty ironic, that everything happened when the world was shutting down with the COVID, said John’s mother, Carol Wlodarchak, on March 24 while sitting next to her son, who was home and doing well after a heart transplant Feb. 27.
Press release content from Business Wire. The AP news staff was not involved in its creation.
OneLegacy Celebrates National Donor Day with Record Setting Year in Heart Transplants
February 11, 2021 GMT
LOS ANGELES (BUSINESS WIRE) Feb 11, 2021
As part of the National Donor Day celebration, observed by the donation and transplantation community every year on February 14, OneLegacy announced today that 2020 was another record-setting year for heart transplants, giving patients with end-stage heart failure or severe coronary artery disease a second chance at life.
OneLegacy is the not-for-profit organ, eye and tissue recovery organization serving seven Southern California counties. Thanks to the gift of life from local donors, OneLegacy was able to work with local transplant centers to make 181 heart transplants possible, up from 176 the prior year and a 22 percent increase over the past four years. A heart transplant involves recovering a heart from a donor, usually someone who ha
Rare triple organ transplant gives Veteran new life va.gov - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from va.gov Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.