Maggie was only 4 when her pediatrician heard a strange clicking in her heart. She didn’t look or feel sick, but tests showed she had a rare, life-threatening condition: high blood pressure in her pulmonary arteries, which carry oxygen-rich blood from the lungs to the heart.
Just the day before, she’d been running around the yard at her Virginia home. Now a MedFlight was carrying her 500 miles away to Boston. She needed both of her lungs replaced—a double-lung transplant—and Boston Children’s Hospital is a world leader in organ transplants for children.
Nothing short of a miracle
While awaiting donor lungs, Maggie suffered cardiac arrest but Boston Children’s doctors revived her and put her on a bypass machine to rest her heart and lungs. Staying on the machine for too many days can be dangerous. As doctors prepared to remove Maggie from bypass, donor lungs became available: the perfect size and condition and an exact match to Maggie’s rare B-positive blood type.
“It was nothing short of a miracle,” she says.
Maggie returned home to Virginia and did all she could to take care of her precious new lungs. But just three years later, at age 7, she began to be short of breath and tired all the time. Her transplanted lungs had begun to fail. She would need another double-lung transplant.
Another lifesaving transplant
There was no question where Maggie’s family would go for help. They had already experienced exceptional care at Boston Children’s, so they moved to Boston and awaited donor lungs.
"I clearly remember starting second grade in my new town. It was really hard to make new friends when I was in a wheelchair, using oxygen and only attending school half days,” Maggie says. “I seemed to get sicker and more tired by the day and by December, all I wanted for Christmas was my breath back."
Donor lungs became available amid a classic New England snowstorm. Doctors told Maggie she was a trailblazer: the first child to have two double-lung transplants at Boston Children’s.
Team Miracle Maggie gives back
Now Maggie is celebrating 20 years since her second transplant. Thanks to the care she received at Boston Children’s, she’s happy and healthy—a proud Boston College grad who loves to travel, hang out with friends and go to Red Sox games.
She and her family and friends formed their own team to help families who come to Boston Children’s looking for hope. Team Miracle Maggie first joined the annual Eversource Walk for Boston Children’s Hospital in 2003, and after a brief hiatus, they returned this year. To date, their team has raised more than $50,000 to provide lifesaving care to kids.
“Without the generosity of both of my organ donor families, the expertise of my Boston Children’s medical team, and the kindness of people who give money to support the hospital, I would not be here today,” Maggie says.
