A Heart for Life: How One Woman’s Transplant Journey Came Full-Circle at Barnes-Jewish Hospital

When Ashley Brooks, RN, BSN, was born, the first hint her parents received that something was out of the ordinary was that nurses didn’t bring their infant daughter from the nursery to their room when it was time to eat. She had been taken to the hospital’s neonatal intensive care unit.

Something was different about Ashley’s heart, but physicians didn’t quite know what. Answers finally came when Ashley was 4 and doctors diagnosed her with restrictive cardiomyopathy, a heart condition in which the heart muscle is too stiff to pump blood properly. Ashley’s childhood, however, was pretty normal—until she turned 18. That year, while she was a senior in high school, she had a stroke, and her doctors decided it was time for her to get on the wait list for a heart transplant. Over the course of two years, her condition worsened, and in 2005, when she was 20, Ashley got the call. There was a heart ready for her.

To honor her organ donor after her successful transplant surgery, Ashley completed nursing school, first working as a cardiac nurse in St. Louis before starting travel nursing and moving to San Diego. However, after her transplant, Ashley developed a condition called coronary allograft vasculopathy. The blood vessels of her transplanted heart narrowed, restricting blood flow. She decided to move back home and turned to Barnes-Jewish Hospital, where she had initially established care before moving to California.

“I knew if I ever needed it, I would go to Barnes-Jewish,” Ashley says. “It’s one of the top hospitals in the nation.”

Caring for the most complex heart patients

In 2008, Ashley met with Jasvindar Singh, MD, FAAC, a WashU Medicine interventional cardiologist at the WashU Medicine and Barnes-Jewish Heart and Vascular Center. The Heart and Vascular Center is a national leader and on the forefront of heart and vascular care, specializing in a range of medical and surgical treatments for even the most complex conditions. In the cardiac catheterization lab, interventional cardiologists diagnose and treat heart conditions—in some cases, during the same procedure. The Heart and Vascular Center is a leader in not only caring for patients with post-transplant vascular disease, like Ashley, but also training physicians around the world to care for them, too.

“Patients with post-transplant vascular disease require a lot of support, including emotional support,” Dr. Singh says. “We have a team that does an amazing job. Starting with the transplant nurses to our resource nurses and our lab staff, we are equipped to care for all heart patients, including those with complex heart conditions related to transplant.”

Ashley’s coronary allograft vasculopathy was rare. “For some people, it comes on slowly, and they develop blockages in the smaller branches of the heart,” Dr. Singh says. “She developed it in the big branches. I kept opening up the blockages so her heart could get blood supply. Never mind how good of a result we got, she would be back again within months. Each time we did it, it became more complex. Her heart muscle was strong, but we realized this could not go on forever.”

Ashley’s heart, which had 13 stents placed to manage her coronary allograft vasculopathy, didn’t have room for more. She needed to relist and undergo a second heart transplant.

WashU Medicine surgeons have been performing heart transplants at Barnes-Jewish since 1985, building a legacy of excellence in heart transplantation and bringing decades of experience to every procedure. Guided by the latest research and using leading-edge technology, WashU Medicine and Barnes-Jewish care teams develop personalized treatment plans and are there for every patient from evaluation through transplant and beyond. Patients receive this comprehensive care for the rest of their lives.

“As someone who had been around cardiac patients as a nurse, I knew that’s where I wanted to be if I was going to get another transplant,” Ashley says.

Facing a second transplant

Preparing for her second transplant was more nerve-racking than the first, Ashley says. She didn’t have the benefit of what she refers to as youthful ignorance—she was now 33—and, as a cardiac nurse herself, she was more aware of the realities of her medical condition.

Second transplants are often more challenging because of scar tissue and because patients are usually sicker or older. Ashley realized she would likely have a more intense recovery than she did after her first transplant.

Still, she was comforted knowing Barnes-Jewish Hospital and WashU Medicine physicians are leaders in heart care. “You know you’re getting top-tier medical care,” Ashley says. “It’s proven that you’re going to be in the best hands.”

In 2018, only a month after being listed for transplant the second time, Ashley got the call: “It’s time,” she remembers the coordinator said. “You have a heart.”

Healing beyond the physical

Ashley’s second transplant surgery was successful, but after the operation, she experienced survivor’s guilt. It was a low point. Faith and family got her through, and Ashley credits the compassionate nurses at Barnes-Jewish with helping her heal not only physically but also mentally.

And now, after joining the team at the Barnes-Jewish cardiac cath lab, Ashley is one of those compassionate nurses—and her transplant journey has come full circle. She works alongside some of the same doctors and nurses who once cared for her, including Dr. Singh, who asks her to share her story with new cardiology fellows. “She helps them realize the journey they’re on is something very special,” Dr. Singh says. “She has a purpose in life. She has a mission.”

Justin Vader, MD, MPH, a WashU Medicine cardiologist at Barnes-Jewish Hospital, is another physician on the transplant team who witnesses the impact Ashley makes in the cath lab.

“Ashley's case is a great example of what heart transplantation can provide not only a patient, but also a community,” he says. “She has taken the gift of life and provided compassionate care and leadership in the cardiac cath lab, a place where patients are facing many of the same anxieties she has faced herself.”

Some of the patients who come to the cath lab are living an experience Ashley knows well.

“My life is hearts,” Ashley says. “I’ll see a transplant patient or a patient who is very sick come into the cath lab, and I’ll think, ‘That was you.’ It’s a good reminder that when I have a day where there’s so much to do, I prayed for a day like that. This is what it’s all about: a normal life.”

Learn more about the WashU Medicine and Barnes-Jewish Transplant Center.