Kaleb’s New Heart

Hi friends,

As most of you may already know, our dear friend Michelle Kurtz and her oldest of four boys, Kaleb are currently in the hospital awaiting a new heart for Kaleb. While a heart transplant is gift of precious life, it also has a long recovery time and many daily doctor visits back and forth to downtown Denver in the months after transplant. This will require 24/7 care provided by his loving family.

With all efforts focused on Kaleb and his healing and to help ease any financial burdens of not being able to work, we would like to offer any and all support that we are able to raise for Michelle’s beautiful family❤️ In addition, please continue to raise Kaleb up in prayer

Below is a message explaining Kaleb’s heart journey

In 1994 Kaleb was born in Grand Junction Colorado where he was flown to Children’s hospital. There Kaleb was diagnosed with Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome. This life threatening condition required a transplant. At just 3 months old this prayer was answered and Kaleb was  given the beautiful gift of life. The average life expectancy for a pediatric heart transplant is only 15 years old. However, Kaleb was able to defy those odds with the help of his beautiful family (Michelle, Collin, Carter and Kamden), and strong faith in God. However after 23 years in 2015, Kaleb was diagnosed with Cardiac Allograft Vasculopathy. This is a condition that occurs in transplanted hearts where the arteries begin to narrow and restrict blood flow, eventually completely closing off resulting in a heart attack and death. Kaleb’s wonderful team at UCHealth worked diligently to try new medication regimens and perform biannual cardiac catheterizations resulting in several stents being placed in his heart over the years. Yet with time his condition worsened and he was diagnosed with worsening artery closures, kidney disease and other accompanying conditions and he was subsequently listed for re-transplant as his heart was beginning to fail. In October 2021 Kaleb went in for his cardiac catheterization and they found a thrombus (blood clot) in his heart. This resulted in an extended hospital stay and a difficult conversation about his worsening heart failure, and its inability to sustain life. This October (2022) Kaleb’s team found a life threatening narrowing and thrombus that they have no other solution other than to transplant Kaleb as soon as possible. Currently Kaleb is in the hospital in critical and worsening condition waiting for a new heart and another chance at life.

Thank you friends!