The Hidden Threat That Nearly Took Jeff's Life

Jeffrey Bell considered himself fit for most of his life—he’d rarely been sick. When he was 40, he was diagnosed with a defect in one of his heart valves, causing some leakage. Being mild, the valve regurgitation hadn’t posed a health concern for years, but Jeffrey knew he’d probably need to have valve surgery eventually.

But in the summer of 2021, when Jeff was 57, something changed. A member of the Franciscan Health Transformation team and an engineer by trade, Jeffrey was working from home in Kokomo. He started losing weight although he wasn’t dieting. He checked in with his local doctor, but doctor found nothing. Yet Jeff kept losing weight.

He continued to work from home, and his health got worse. But with no one else at home to notice the changes in him, he continued to soldier on.

By February 2022, he’d lost 50 pounds and still didn’t know why. By then he was also showing signs of edema, or fluid buildup in his limbs. When he showed up in Crown Point for an in-person meeting, his colleagues were alarmed at his appearance. They insisted he get to the Franciscan Health Crown Point emergency room, right now.

That’s when he learned that the place where he earned his livelihood would also save his life.

A blood test and an echocardiogram revealed that Jeffrey had endocarditis, an infection that began in the defective heart valve. That would seem bad enough, but while at the ER, Jeffrey went into septic shock due to the infection. This caused his other organs to start shutting down. All of a sudden, he was fighting for his life. He was put on dialysis for his kidneys and a ventilator/respirator.

“When I saw Jeff in the ER, he looked like he was on death’s doorstep,” said J. Michael Tuchek, DO, cardiothoracic surgeon with who practices at Franciscan Health Crown Point. “I wasn’t sure he was going to make it through the day.”

“There were at least three or four doctors in the ER with me at that time, including Dr. Tuchek,” said Jeffrey, putting together a treatment plan.

Before the cardiothoracic surgeon could address Jeffrey’s valve issue, the sepsis had to be brought under control. Jeffrey was medically induced into a coma state for treatment. After the infections had cleared within a few days, Dr. Tuchek performed valve replacement surgery for not just one but two infected heart valves, during an eight-hour operation. Jeff spent an additional month in the Intensive Care Unit and about another month in inpatient rehab before going home.

Through it all, Jeff said, Dr. Tuchek kept his mother and father, who lived hours away from Crown Point, regularly informed about his care and progress. His mother and father were very thankful for the outstanding communication and state-of-the-art treatment their son had received.

“His recovery was nothing short of miraculous,” said Dr. Tuchek. “He never gave up despite the dire situation he was in.”

In no time, his life seemed to edge back to normal. He started working part time from home in his Franciscan role by early-May; by June he was back to full-time—normal, but with a very changed perspective about the work he was doing.

“This experience has reinvigorated me in what I do,” he said. “I know what patient-centric care is all about now.”