Local News in Brief : Orange : Heart Recipient Home After May 31 Surgery
A 45-year-old Anaheim man who became the county’s third heart-transplant patient was released from UCI Medical Center on Thursday.
Dr. Richard Ott, who performed the operation on Gene Reynolds on May 31, said the Pacific Bell employee was released early because of his rapid improvement.
“He is one of those patients who recovered very well . . . no complications,” said Ott, who had performed the first heart transplant in Orange County on April 8. The second such operation in the county was performed at Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian on April 20.
Reynolds had suffered from cardiomyopathy, a weaking of the heart muscles, for two years before the transplant.
The donor was a 21-year-old Carlsbad college student who was killed in a traffic accident in San Bernardino over the Memorial weekend. At the request of his family, he was not identified.
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