news&views

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2012 A PUBLICATION FOR THE NYU LANGONE MEDICAL CENTER COMMUNITY

Beatrice De Gea

Molly, a four-month-old infant who had surgery at NYU Langone Medical Center to repair a hole in her heart, receives a warm welcome from her twin brother, Jack, as they are reunited at home.

Mending Molly
An Infant with a Damaged Heart and Her Heartbroken Parents Find a Team of
Cardiac Specialists Who Give Their Story the Happiest of Endings

After years of trying to conceive with fertility treatments, Nancy Frankenberg, 47, and her husband, Josh Parker, 48, decided on one more round, using donor eggs. This time, the stars aligned. Nancy not only became pregnant, but with twins—a male and a female. “We hit the jackpot,” she told family and friends.

Five months passed in joyful anticipation. Then
came an omen—an abnormal finding on an ultrasound.
A missing artery in one of the umbilical cords, often
a sign of congenital anomalies, brought the couple to
N YU Langone Medical Center, where they consulted
Achiau Ludomirsky, MD, the Andrall E. Pearson
Professor of Pediatric Cardiology and chief of the
Division of Pediatric Cardiology.

(continued on page 5)

a large hole between the left and right ventricles and obstructed blood flow to the lungs. The condition occurs in 0.4% of the population, but open-heart surgery, ideally performed at four to six months of age, can repair the defect. “It was incredibly scary,” recalls Frankenberg.

“I couldn’t stop thinking that she could die in surgery.” They coped with their anxiety by planning for the births. “We’re both strong people and not ones to obsess,” explains Parker, who, like his wife, works in sales.

The Less Stressful Stress Test
and Other Weekend Options
As Seven-Day-a-Week Services Expand,
Patients Are Afforded Ever More
Choices and Conveniences

John Abbott

Perhaps the only thing more stressful than undergoing a medical test or procedure is making the time for it amid so many personal and professional obligations. N YU Langone Medical Center has found a way to help: offer patients more options than ever to tend to their healthcare needs during off-peak hours. While N YU Langone’s caregivers have always been on call 24/7 for emergency procedures, the expansion of nonemergent care marks an important step toward becoming a true seven-day-a-week hospital, with the entire Medical Center humming at full capacity day in, day out.

The Medical Center has been gradually shifting its operational center of gravity, with roughly half of its diagnostic, clinical, and surgical services now ramped up for weekend duty. “Saturday and Sunday services are not meant to Nuclear stress tests, conducted in the Jean & David Blechman Cardiac & Vascular Center, are just one of many diagnostic tests now available on Saturdays.