Kristin M A Second Chance at Life

Kristin has been cleared to run again, and she’s visited the ICU at RWJUH Hamilton several times to see the staff members. “I owe so much to them.”

It was a beautiful July afternoon in Yardville, and 48-year old Kristin Mizenko could hardly wait to lace up her sneakers and hit the streets. A seasoned runner, she jogged three to five miles daily, and despite the sweltering 95-degree heat, she looked forward to her 45 minutes of exercise.

Unfortunately, her dream run turned into a nightmare when she went into cardiac arrest—in which the heart malfunctions and stops beating—and collapsed about a quarter mile from her home. A neighbor, Anthony Pompei, who is a state trooper, saw Kristin fall. He immediately leapt from his car to begin administering CPR. Other neighbors quickly converged to call 911 and offer assistance.

One of them was Chris Andrulis, RN, a nursing supervisor at Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital (RWJUH) Hamilton. “None of us knew who Kristin was, although we’d seen her jogging before,” recalls Andrulis, who has been a nurse for 46 years. She and Anthony took turns performing CPR on Kristin, who wasn’t breathing. “We’re lucky she was found so quickly,” says Andrulis. “It was so hot everyone was inside with the windows shut and the air conditioning on at full blast.”

Top-notch care

Thankfully, Kristin was whisked to RWJUH Hamilton in an ambulance, where paramedics used a defibrillator to shock her heart. A neighbor had been able to identify her and called her husband, Todd, who raced to the hospital. “I was met by the chaplain, ” he recalls. Fortunately, Kristin’s heart began to beat again. RWJUH Hamilton critical care physicians had induced hypothermia—a below-normal body temperature—to reduce brain inflammation, which can occur after cardiac arrest as a result of the stopping and starting of blood flow to the brain. Inflammation can cause permanent cognitive and neurologic damage.

Todd wasn’t prepared for the first glimpse he got of his wife when he walked into the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) and saw her surrounded by a bevy of machines, tubes and wires. He was put at ease, however, by her nurse, Grace Chizek, BSN, RN, as well as critical care physician Howard Waksman, MD. “Both did a great job explaining everything that was going on and answering all of my questions, ” says Todd. It turns out that Kristin’s cardiac arrest was likely caused by a genetic abnormality.

Kristin remained in the ICU for almost three weeks but wasn’t awake or alert for the first 10 days. “She’d have a burst of activity where she would talk and make jokes for about a half hour, then sleep for six,” says Todd. “Her physicians reassured us that this was her brain’s way of trying to heal itself.” Initially, Kristin had trouble remembering close family members like her son, Justin, 16. But when Todd showed her Facebook posts and photos of Justin, her memory gradually returned.

A miraculous recovery

More than nine months later, Kristin has made a successful recovery. She received an implantable cardioverter defibrillator, a device that shocks the heart to restore a normal heartbeat if a person’s heart is beating erratically. She also underwent rehabilitation for three weeks. While she still struggles with memory problems, she was able to return to work last fall as a special education assistant.

Kristin’s recovery was due to a combination of factors: the immediate CPR, defibrillation and hypothermia protocol, saysChristina Wjasow, MD, Kristin’s cardiologist. Todd believes Chizek’s outstanding care also contributed to Kristin’s recovery. She sang to Kristin daily, played music for her, and even washed and styled her hair—no easy feat in the ICU. Last year, Todd nominated Chizek for a Daisy Award, which she received. The award honors exceptional nurses at hospitals across the country. Kristin has been cleared to run again, and she’s visited the ICU at RWJUH Hamilton several times to see the staff members. “I owe so much to them,” she says.

Keeping heart failure patients healthy

More than 20 percent of heart failure patients are readmitted to the hospital within 30 days and about half by six months. Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital (RWJUH) Hamilton is determined to reverse this trend with its innovative Healthy Lives Heart Failure program, which launched in April.

The program’s multidisciplinary team—including a cardiologist, nurse practitioner, nurse, pharmacist, nutritionist and social worker—gives patients and family members the tools they need to manage their disease. “Managing heart failure is difficult,” says Connie Moceri, Director of Disease Management.

“It requires patients to adhere to a diet and daily medication regimen and to monitor their symptoms.” Once patients hospitalized with heart failure are discharged, they’ll return for outpatient visits within four to five days. “This allows us to see how they’re doing at home,” says Moceri. “Are they able to adhere to their medication schedule? Are they eating the right foods? The hope is that they’ll be able to manage their heart failure so well on their own that they won’t need repeat hospitalizations.

Get it Checked

Your heart doesn’t beat just for you. Get it checked. To schedule an appointment with an RWJUH Hamilton cardiac specialist, call888.724.7123 or visitwww.rwjbh.org/hamiltonheart.