Pattison woman receives city’s first open-heart surgery

Published 12:00 am Tuesday, April 29, 2003

Pattison resident Fannie Collins holds a pillow she received after her open heart surgery at River Region Medical Center. Collins, the first person to receive open-heart surgery in a Vicksburg hospital, is pictured outside her home with her cousin, Mildred Smith, left, daughter Ethel Brooks, and husband, J.P. Collins. The pillow was signed by hospital personnel.(C. Todd Sherman The Vicksburg Post)

[04/29/03]Medical history in Vicksburg was made at River Region Medical Center last month when a Pattison woman became the first to undergo open-heart surgery here.

“I’ve been getting better and better,” said 74-year-old Fannie Collins at her Claiborne County home three weeks after undergoing a quadruple coronary bypass on March 24.

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“At first, I was a little jittery because I didn’t know and I said, Well, God is in the plan and the doctors are here,’ and that’s all we need,” she said.

The surgery to “bypass” blockage in four arteries and provide needed blood to the heart was performed by Dr. Edward Crocker, a cardiovascular surgeon on the River Region staff since last year.

“The surgery went really well,” he said. “I’m very proud of the whole team.”

Collins was considered a high-risk patient because of her age and because she is a diabetic, has high blood pressure and is overweight, Crocker said.

“The deck was stacked against us, and it went as perfect as you can ask for any case to go,” said profusionist and physician’s assistant Larry C. Daily, who helped in the procedure.

The heart center, which since has performed two other open-heart surgeries, is in the hospital’s $123 million facility on U.S. 61 North that opened in February 2002. Part of the plan in consolidating the formerly separate ParkView and Vicksburg medical centers was to add medical services not previously available in Vicksburg. The large surgical suite for open-chest heart procedures was set to open March 15 and officially went into service with Collins’ surgery.

River Region staff have spent the past year training and preparing to open the heart center, marketing director Diane Gawronski said.

Before last month, patients were sent to hospitals in Jackson or elsewhere if a stent, angioplasty or open-heart surgery was needed, she said. Heart catherizations have been done by cardiologists since 2000 at ParkView Regional Medical Center and continue at River Region today.

To open the center, the hospital filed a certificate of need and asked for permission from the state department of health, she said.

“We felt there was a need because heart disease is prevalent not only in the state of Mississippi but Warren County and the surrounding communities,” Gawronski said.

River Region serves the 49,000 residents in Vicksburg and Warren County in addition to the residents in Lorman, Port Gibson, Rolling Fork, Tinsley, Valley Park, Edwards, Holly Bluff, Pattison, Redwood, Satartia, Utica and Yazoo City.

Collins’ husband, J.P. Collins, was grateful for having the service at a hospital closer to home. “I want to thank River Region for doing the heart surgery instead of us having to go to Jackson,” he said.

Additionally, the center offers a procedure called endoscopic vein harvesting. The technique requires two small incisions on the patient’s leg, instead of opening the leg from the groin to the ankle and greatly reducing the patient’s discomfort, he said. The veins are transplanted to the heart to replace the blocked blood vessels.

In select cases, the center will offer beating heart surgery, a new technology in which the patient’s heart is not stopped.

The heart center has about 25 staff members, including Crocker and cardiologists.

And Collins said they all treated her well.

“I didn’t have to wish for anything,” she said. “They were always there for me.”

Since her surgery, Collins said she has been following doctors’ orders, which included a strict diet, exercise and rest.

“The fire in that little lady set the stage for no excuses for younger people who go through this,” said Darren Williamson, a clinical nurse specialist who helped in Collins’ post-operation recovery.