After undergoing a lifesaving surgery, Elizabeth Wehrle was determined to make the most of every day.
Wehrle, 36, had a “first of its kind” quadruple-organ transplant at Northwestern Memorial Hospital — the first ever performed on a patient with a prior lung transplant in the United States.
“Because of their selfless gift, I get to go home this week, hug my son and continue living a life I wasn’t sure I’d get to have,” Wehrle said Tuesday at a news conference.
The Iowa resident was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis at age 11, a genetic disease that damages the lungs, digestive system and other organs. She underwent a double-lung transplant in 2017, but her health declined this year.
On Feb. 17, Werhle went for a doctor’s appointment and never returned home.
Doctors diagnosed her with a severe form of chronic rejection, meaning her body was attacking her transplanted lungs, and she was immediately hospitalized. Doctors said the condition is often fatal and so high-risk that patients are rarely eligible for a second transplant.
But a team of doctors at Northwestern said they were determined to give her another chance at life.
They came up with a plan, and in March, Wehrle underwent a second transplant surgery for more than eight hours. This time, surgeons transplanted two lungs, a liver and a kidney.
While patients in need of an organ transplant often face long waits for a match, Northwestern has reported one of the shortest average wait times, with patients typically waiting about three days for an available organ. Given how serious Wehrle’s condition was, her doctors said they were optimistic that organs would become available.
“When we heard about Elizabeth, we couldn’t just say that nothing can be done,” said Dr. Ankit Bharat, chief of thoracic surgery at Northwestern. “So it was really about trying to figure out how we can bring new solutions to our patients.”
After developing a surgical plan, Bharat said the team also had to anticipate potential challenges, including minimizing blood loss, improving safety and keeping the organs viable throughout the lengthy procedure.
On March 17, Wehrle was admitted to the cardiothoracic intensive care unit at Northwestern Memorial Hospital and was listed for a quadruple-organ transplant two days later. On March 22, she received word that four donor organs had become available. Thoracic surgeons began the double-lung retransplant that evening, and abdominal surgeons followed in the early morning hours of March 23 with the liver and kidney transplants.
The road to recovery was incredibly difficult, said Wehrle, but the thought of reuniting with her 11-year-old son Landry gave her the strength to keep going.
After months of rehab, Wehrle can now walk more than 4 miles a day. She will return home this week, and she said she’s looking forward to spending the rest of the summer with her son at the pool.
Wehrle said her health journey has given her a new perspective on life. After her first transplant surgery, she said she was determined to live life to the fullest. But over time, she found herself living as though her future was guaranteed. Now, she said she will never take life for granted.
“This definitely taught me to just truly take it day by day and make the most of it,” she said.
While Wehrle’s surgery was the first of its kind in the country, doctors at Northwestern have a history of taking on complex cases and performing multiorgan transplant procedures, including a double-lung transplant on a patient with Stage 4 terminal cancer and an “awake” kidney transplant on a patient with Crohn’s disease.