Jamaican woman gets free life-saving surgery in Springs

Karen Campbell lives in a tropical paradise, but the azure waters and lush landscape didn't ease her spirits when her heart began to die.

With a failing aortic valve left over from a childhood bout of rheumatic fever, the 33-year-old Jamaican woman's options were limited on the 4,200-square-mile isle with 2.5 million people. There are only eight critical care beds, and heart surgery is hard to come by at best and not an option at worst.

As fluids pooled in Campbell's feet and ankles and her oxygendepleted blood left her in constant exhaustion, a favor from one physician to another saved her life. She received a new aortic valve, free of charge, at Penrose Hospital at the hands of Dr. James Stewart.

Tuesday, after a 12-day recovery and a clean bill of health, she flew home. Penrose, like Memorial Health System and most other hospitals, performs millions of dollars in charity care each year for U.S. residents. And many U.S. doctors also volunteer time to go abroad and help the needy through various charitable organizations to help reconstruct cleft palates and perform other services.

But, in a lesser-known form of good will, some foreign doctors who can't help their patients use oldfashioned networking until they find someone, somewhere, who can.

In this case, Dr. William A.A. Foster, of Kingston, Jamaica, phoned Stewart, who has taken three previous patients from him over the years. Foster calls on other doctors as well, Stewart said, to help the many patients who have run out of options at home.

It is an informal network in which doctors meet at conferences, go to school or train together, and exchange cards, and later rely on those relationships to help their patients, where lives ride on the twist and flip of a Rolodex.

Penrose has committed to allowing Stewart to take one foreign-born patient a year, he said. So far, he's taken five patients.

"I'm just glad we can help," Stewart said.

Campbell underwent two previous surgeries in Jamaica to help her heart, including a mitral valve replacement. But when her aortic valve began to deteriorate a year ago, surgery was no longer an option there. An athletic woman with a penchant for netball, a sport similar to basketball, she went from active to largely bedbound. Her sickly condition, she said, has kept her from getting a job or going to school.

That may soon change. Stewart said the five-hour surgery on Aug. 8, valued at about $40,000, was a success, and Campbell was feeling better as she recovered at Penrose's Stearman House last week.

She said she wants to return home, where her parents, six siblings and many other relatives live. She hopes to find work and possibly attend school.

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Contact the writer: 636-0198 or brian.newsome@gazette.com