![]() Because Konrad Reuland died at 29, the name carries added meaning. The program’s name came from Carew’s jersey number. ![]() The families plan to work together, especially on “Heart of 29,” the campaign Carew started last year with the American Heart Association. Carew’s family has long been signed up as organ donors in memory of his daughter, Michelle, who died of leukemia when she was unable to get a match for a bone marrow transplant. Mary lost her father and a 31-year-old brother to heart attacks Ralf’s father has received a stent and battles atrial fibrillation.īoth families want to encourage more people to become organ donors. Heart disease has touched the Reulands, too. He received the heart and kidney two days later. He got the call that a match was found on Dec. Last fall, blood thinners he took as part of his protocol led to bleeding in his brain, making it more urgent for him to get a new heart.Ĭarew went on the transplant waiting list the Friday before Thanksgiving and moved higher a few weeks later. He spent a year with a left ventricular assist device in his chest handling the work of his damaged heart. She’d signed up to do it, so he did, too.Ĭarew’s health issues began in September 2015 when he had a near-fatal heart attack while playing golf. He asked his mother whether he should become an organ donor. After spending nearly a month on the transplant list, he would be getting a new heart and a new kidney at age 71. Last April, Konrad Reuland was renewing his driver’s license in his parents’ home. Bigger than the Hall of Fame, Carew said. Her final words to the representative of the organ procurement network were, “Make sure his heart goes to a really good person because Konrad was a really good person.” He underwent surgery, but never woke from a coma and his brain activity stopped a few weeks later.ĭuring the final hours Mary Reuland spent with her oldest child, she kept her right ear on his chest. ![]() The aneurysm, a ballooning in an artery in his brain, burst a few days later. Last fall, Reuland was on a treadmill when he experienced a severe headache. “We are so thankful, so grateful, so there aren’t adequate words,” Rhonda Crew told the Reulands. Reuland’s parents, Ralf and Mary, and their youngest son Austin took turns listening through a stethoscope to Konrad’s heart beating inside Carew’s chest when they met the former baseball star and his wife Rhonda, according to the American Heart Association News. No one ahead of Carew on the transplant list was immune. The two men’s blood type was the same, but the key factor was both were immune from Hepatitis B. The Reulands were told the recipient was a 71-year-old man from Orange County. The only details the Carew family received before the transplant were that the donor was “male, late 20s, local, exceptionally healthy.” ![]()
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