Thursday, April 12, 2012

What was your heart meant to do?

“The heart really wants to beat.” Matthew Bock, organ procurement

Way back the first weekend in March, when we still had snow on the ground, I drove to Waupaca early one Saturday morning to earn some CEUs for my day job. As always, the speakers were engaging, the meal was excellent and the company of others working as medical assistants throughout the state of Wisconsin was rewarding. I maybe only see these women a few times a year, but they are all dear friends.

One of the speakers was Matthew Bock who works in organ procurement with UW Hospitals. He is part of the team who goes in when someone’s death is imminent, takes out their usable organs and flies back to the hospital to plant these organs into the lucky recipient. His stories were fascinating and full of hope, hope when things are inconceivably grim.

When certain organs are transplanted, it’s sometimes hard to see that they are doing anything, hard to tell right away if you really made a difference. The heart, though. Matt shared that when they are done implanting a new heart and they take the patient off of bypass, in most cases, boom, the heart just starts working. Sometimes it takes a little tap, but somehow that heart knows what it needs to do. It wants to get back in a body, get sewn up to all the blood vessels and start to beat again. It’s what a heart was meant to do.

What was your heart meant to do?

2 comments:

Denise said...

I wish I knew!! Some would think, that working as a CMA for 26 yrs, that I could say that, but, in reality I not sure that is it. Maybe just being a good friend will have to do or maybe it is still waiting for me to discover.

Chris Loehmer Kincaid said...

I agree, Denise. Maybe some hearts are meant to do lots of different things. I am waiting patiently for the next thing to come along.