Stephanie Ramon Martinez - Double Lung Transplant

Stephanie Ramon Martinez contracted COVID-19 in July 2020. She was living in
Mission, Texas, with her husband and two daughters, ages 14 and 20. Early July,
she temporarily moved in with her mother in her hometown of Corpus Christi,
Texas. Her mom was recovering from breast cancer surgery and would start
chemotherapy in the weeks to come. Since this happened during the summer,
Stephanie, 43 year old middle school math teacher, made plans to stay with her
mom during the month of July and part of August.
During her stay, Stephanie contracted COVID. Symptoms began soon. First were
the body aches, headaches, and fever. Then she began experiencing breathing
difficulties. She drove herself to Corpus Christi Medical Center Doctors Regional
Hospital. There, her health quickly deteriorated. She developed Double
Pneumonia and needed to be sedated, intubated and became temporarily
paralyzed for not being able to oxygenate her body due to the severity of
pneumonia. Matters took a turn for the worse when the virus shut down her
kidneys and Stephanie was placed on continuous dialysis. As the virus continued
to attack her body, oxygenation became harder to maintain and in a last lifesaving
attempt, requested by her pulmonologist, Stephanie was transferred in the
middle of the night via ambulance to San Antonio Brooks Army Medical Center.
There she was placed on an ECMO, a kind of heart-lung machine, which would
give her body time to heal while the machine performed the oxygenation her
body needed. Stephanie remained on the ECMO from August 15-23. After being
removed from machine, doctors performed a Tracheostomy. Doctors took her off
sedation. She regained consciousness, completely unaware of her surroundings
or what she had been through during her severely ill episode. Under the skill and
expertise of her doctors, she was weened off dialysis and her kidneys began to
function normally again. However, her lungs were still very fragile. Her medical
stay at Brooks came to an end, and she was transferred back to Corpus. She was
placed in a long-term acute center. There she would be close to her family, and
all hope remained that her lungs would heal At the LTAC facility her condition
began to worsen. Once again, ventilator settings were increased, and blood tests
showed she had developed pneumonia. In the middle of the night, Stephanie was
rushed to the ICU at Christus Spohn Hospital. Antibiotics were administered and
her ventilator settings reached close to the point where she was at 100 percent
oxygen, with very little room on air pressure going higher to keep her oxygenated.

At this point, doctors and nurses said there was not much they could do for her.
She was diagnosed with Pulmonary Fibrosis, an incurable condition. Even though
this was an emotional turmoil of days filled with fear and giving up all hope,
Stephanie still found the strength to fight for her life with unyielding faith,
resiliency and determination, even though she was isolated from any family
contact due to still testing COVID positive two months after acquiring the virus.
She was not contagious, but she was still shedding the virus. Stephanie’s strong
faith and determination paid off. With time, her ventilator settings were lowered,
visitation was allowed, and she recovered from the pneumonia. In due course,
Stephanie was transferred to another LTAC facility due to her condition being
stable and not in immediate medical need. At the LTAC health professionals
continued to try and ween her off the ventilator. Even though progress was made,
it was not enough to get her off the support of the ventilator. After a few days,
Stephanie developed another infection which made it difficult for her to breathe
even with the support of ventilator. She was transferred back to ICU. By this time,
she already had two collapsed lungs which required she undergo a very painful
procedure to inflate her lungs. Her lungs collapsed on two separate occasions and
twice she endured the pain of this procedure. But Stephanie again refused to give
up, and she recovered from the infection. After being fed, via a feeding tube, for
more than 5 months, Stephanie finally ate her first solid meal. That was a huge
accomplishment. Her medical stay ran out at Spohn on January 2021, and she
was transferred via ambulance to another LTAC, but this time in San Antonio. At
this point, Stephanie and her family’s request for a double lung transplant had
already been denied 3 times in Texas. This denial was painful and difficult to deal
with since it is her only chance to live as close to a normal life as possible and
return home to her family. Stephanie’s husband reached out to Northwestern
Hospital Transplant Center in Chicago, Illinois after reading an article on Dr. Ankit
Bharat, MBBS, Chief of Thoracic surgery at Northwestern Medicine and Director
of the Lung Transplant Program. He had conducted the first lung transplant of a
Covid-19 patient in the United States. After reviewing her medical records and
interviewing Stephanie’s husband and mother, Northwestern Hospital
determined she is a possible candidate for a double lung transplant. She is
currently at Northwestern undergoing a thorough evaluation by a medical team
to determine if she is a qualifying candidate. Stephanie has been in hospitals for
approximately 7 months. She has not physically seen her two daughters since

September. They resort to Face Time and texts as the only ways to communicate.
Stephanie is currently unable to speak loud enough to have a conversation due to
the tracheostomy still in place. Stephanie is God’s miracle who to this day
remains resilient, determined, hopeful, positive and with very strong faith in our
Lord that she will soon come home to her loving family and embrace them once
again.
And this is where we stand today. Waiting and praying for a YES, followed by a
very successful surgery and recuperation so that in time Stephanie will come back
home to her loving family and we will be able to embrace her with lots of love
again.