55-Year-Old Cardiomyopathy Patient Heads To Dominican Republic

A 55-year-old resident of The Villages, Fla., suffering from cardiomyopathy will be spending $64,000, half raised by friends and neighbors, to travel to the Dominican Republic for stem cell treatments. Her dream is to fix her serious heart problem – her heart is operating at 20% capacity – and see her youngest grandchild start kindergarten. The stem cell procedure by Fla. physician Zannos Grekos involves extraction and re-injection of her own stem cells, an experimental procedure that has not been approved in the United States. “Any time you do any kind of procedure with the heart, you have some kind of risk, and I understand that,” the patient said.

By Theresa Campbell, “Stem cell procedure gives Villages resident hope of seeing granddaughter’s high school graduation”, © 2009 The Villages Daily Sun