Cheryl Mehrkar was an “adrenaline junkie” who relished being a scuba divemaster and using her 2003 Harley-Davidson Sportster in North Carolina, Maine, and close to her dwelling in Dutchess County.
She had additionally achieved a fourth-degree karate black belt and dabbled in skydiving and bungee leaping. Now, Mehrkar has a brand new feat for her uncommon résumé — she’s the world’s first recipient of a totally robotic double lung transplant.
“I’ve been in awe — it’s an unbelievable thing,” Mehrkar, 57, advised The Submit on Wednesday shortly after being discharged from NYU Langone Well being.
Dr. Stephanie H. Chang, an affiliate professor within the Division of Cardiothoracic Surgical procedure at NYU Grossman College of Medication, led the minimally invasive process on Oct. 22.
Chang made small incisions between Mehrkar’s ribs earlier than using the da Vinci Xi robotic system to take away her diseased lungs, put together her coronary heart and airway for implantation and stitch in donor lungs.
“The benefits are really significantly smaller incisions, so better healing for the patient and less post-operative pain,” mentioned Chang, surgical director of the Lung Transplant Program for the NYU Langone Transplant Institute.
The transplant institute carried out 76 lung transplants in 2023.
Just some months in the past, Chang was lauded for main the primary absolutely robotic lung transplant within the nation, utilizing the novel approach to exchange a person’s proper lung.
“It was a very huge milestone for us, but the reason why double-lung transplant is different is that’s what a majority of patients get,” Chang defined. “So we needed to improve the single technique where it was short enough and efficient enough for us to be able to do two [lungs] in a short setting without any damage to the new organs.”
After her process, which lasted about seven hours, Mehrkar marveled that she may take a “good breath” nearly instantly.
“And it’s just gotten better,” Mehrkar gushed.
It’s a stark distinction from 15 years in the past, when she observed she was barely in need of breath whereas doing leaping jacks and sit-ups together with her karate college students on the dojo she co-owned together with her husband.
Mehrkar was recognized in 2010 with persistent obstructive pulmonary illness, which prompted her to give up smoking.
COPD describes a group of circumstances, like emphysema and persistent bronchitis, that injury the lungs and limit airflow.
Mehrkar was later knowledgeable that she had an overactive thyroid, which triggered her to lose “incredible amounts” of weight — but it surely wasn’t till she contracted COVID-19 in 2022 that “everything went downhill.”
She wanted at-home oxygen remedy and her husband, Shahin, retired to develop into her caretaker. They closed their beloved dojo final yr.
Mehrkar, who has a GoFundMe to assist together with her mediacl payments, underwent surgical procedure simply days after being positioned on the transplant listing. She believes the robotic approach led to much less ache and a shorter restoration time.
“It’s been such a positive, healthy experience,” she enthused.
Mehrkar doesn’t think about she’ll be as adventurous as earlier than, however she hopes to return to the actions she loves, together with being a volunteer emergency medical technician with the Union Vale Hearth Division in Dutchess County.
And he or she plans to jot down a letter to the household of the person who donated his lungs to her.
“I can only imagine the grieving that family went through while I was getting better,” Mehrkar mentioned. “And I just need them to know that he’s living and he’s doing good, and I will do everything I can to take care of these lungs — and that’s a promise.”
