Puyallup Teen Receives The Greatest Gift For Christmas -- Lifesaving Heart Transplant Performed In The Nick Of Time

If everything goes without complications, Nicole Ehli, an 18-year-old high-school junior from Puyallup, will have literally received the gift of her life this Christmas.

On Christmas Eve, Ehli received a new heart during a seven-hour operation by a 13-member medical team at University of Washington Medical Center.

Yesterday, Ehli's condition was listed as critical but stable. She is conscious, breathing on her own and talking with her family, according to L.G. Blanchard, hospital spokesman. Her heart is beating on its own.

The donor heart became available "not a day too soon," said Blanchard. He said Ehli was a "status one" transplant candidate, meaning her death was imminent if she did not receive a heart.

Ehli, who attends Franklin Pierce High School, suffers from idiopathic cardiomyopathy, a narrowing of the arteries that left her heart unable to pump sufficient blood.

She began getting ill five years ago, with weakness, low blood pressure and an irregular heartbeat. "She was pretty much a very normal girl until she started getting sick," Blanchard said. She likes to fish and loves animals, he said.

Ehli has been at the medical center for two months awaiting a donor heart. By Wednesday, the 4-foot-8, 70-pound teen had a nagging infection, and her left ventricle was failing. Dr. Dan Fishbein, a cardiologist, called heart surgeon Edward Verrier at home.

"I think she's going to die tonight," he told Verrier.

They reviewed their choices. A procedure similar to angioplasty, reaming the passages through the heart with a balloon? Different drugs? Mechanical assistance to the heart?

None looked good, but the mechanical approach offered the most hope.

Then a heart - a perfect match - became available in Las Vegas.

Verrier got the call Thursday morning. The organ was on the way. The doctor went to the hospital and woke Ehli's mother, who had been sleeping in the intensive-care unit.

"I said, `We have a heart,' " he recalled. "It was one of those things where everybody looked at each other and said, `There's no better Christmas present than that.' "

Christmas Eve plans were dropped. Verrier scrubbed in.

Ehli's parents, Don and Delores Ehli, are not talking with the media for now, Blanchard said. "It has been a very scary and emotional time for the family, and they are exhausted," he said.

If past heart transplants at the medical center are an indication, Ehli's chances are good. The 5-year survival rate for heart recipients is 87 percent, one of the highest in the nation, Blanchard said.