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‘Baby Rachel’ Receives a New Heart in Loma Linda

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From a Times Staff Writer

“Baby Rachel,” one of two baby girls for whom Loma Linda University Medical Center issued a national plea for heart donors three weeks ago, underwent a heart transplant operation here early Tuesday morning, hospital officials said.

A third infant, 15-month-old “Baby James,” underwent heart transplant surgery performed by Dr. Leonard Bailey, director of pediatric cardiac surgery at the medical center, on Saturday, a hospital spokesman said.

The operation on 3-month-old Baby Rachel, who was born with a deformed heart, was also performed by Bailey, spokesman Richard Schaefer said.

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The other infant girl, identified only as “Baby Vicki,” who was born within a week of Baby Rachel and who suffered from a severely weakened heart muscle, died April 15. A heart donor could not be found for her, Schaefer said.

Bailey is the doctor who placed a baboon’s heart into a 12-day-old girl known as Baby Fae in October, 1984. She died at the medical center 20 days later.

Schaefer said the condition of Baby James, who was born with a weakened heart muscle and also suffered from pneumonia and congestive heart failure in recent months, was upgraded Tuesday from critical to fair.

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Schaefer refused to provide details about the hometowns, full identities or donors in the cases of Baby Rachel and Baby James because the infants’ parents have requested confidentiality.

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