34-year-old Davey Bauer had lived most of his life without any serious medical ailments. He exercised regularly and particularly enjoyed skateboarding and snowboarding. He worked an arduous job as a landscaper, often putting in long hours in punishing heat. When he caught a debilitating flu in May, it baffled doctors.
Bauer’s physician’s initially brushed his illness off as pneumonia, his girlfriend, Susan Gore, told People. But the cause was much more insidious. While leading an otherwise healthy lifestyle, Bauer was also a dedicated vaper for 10 years, typically going through one nicotine cartridge each day. To the Missouri resident, vaping “seemed like a healthier alternative” to smoking cigarettes. But according to Evapo, one 20 mg/ml cartridge is equivalent to 20–40 cigarettes.
The vaping habit had deteriorated to such a degree that Bauer’s lungs were “completely damaged.”
Following his misdiagnosis, Gore took Bauer to a local emergency room, where he caught a strain of Pseudomonas. Pseudomonas is an infection-causing bacteria. The CDC warns it’s becoming increasingly difficult to treat as it’s built tremendous resistance to antibiotics.
“When the infection is … so overwhelming and so bad, the body doesn't even have the opportunity to clear the infection,” Ankit Bharat, Bauer’s surgeon, told People. “The bacteria eats away the lung and causes more and more pus creation.”
Bauer was transferred to Chicago’s Northwest University “as a last-ditch effort” to save his life, Bharat said. As soon as the patient arrived, he went into cardiac arrest. Bharat was forced to remove Bauer’s lungs so that his body had some chance to fight the infection.
It was then that the idea of breast implants were introduced. Bharat needed to keep Bauer’s heart stable after the removal of his lungs. He decided the best way to do this was to install two double-D implants, one on each side of his heart.
The surgeon proceeded to drain all of Bauer’s blood, and created a new circulatory system which Bauer’s heart, thanks to support from the two breast implants, continued to pump through. In the meantime, artificial lungs helped the patient to breathe.
“We had to come up with something very creative,” Bharat recalled. “This is the only way we could logically create a solution that may give the patient a fighting chance.”
The doctor downplayed the role of the breast implants, however, reiterating that they were mostly a means to an end. “The breast implant is a flashy thing, but to be honest with you, probably from a medical standpoint, was a minor part of the whole thing,” Bharat admitted. “Because it was mostly used to just temporarily stabilize the heart.”
As for Bauer, he was highly amused when informed that breast implants had saved his life. “I thought it was hilarious,” he told People. “I was honestly jealous,” Gore responded jokingly.
Both patient and doctor are sure that vaping contributed in large part to Bauer’s condition. They’re now using their platform to call attention to the dangers of vaping. Amongst other dangers, studies have shown it can lower sperm count and shrink testicles. “In my personal opinion, vaping played a big part in how sick Davey got, because he’s young and otherwise healthy,” Bharat reflected. “Lungs are designed to breathe clean air, they're not designed to inhale smoke.”
from Men's Journal https://ift.tt/5o9k281
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