Heart Hero Sara and her mom, Nonnie, invite you to “Save the Day for CHD” at the Denver Superhero Heart Run! The 6th Annual Denver Superhero Heart Run is August 23, 2020 as a virtual event and you are invited to walk, run and FLY to “Save the Day for CHD” for the #1in100!

Sara Opal was born full term and a seemingly healthy baby girl on June 15, 2015.  At 24 hours old they did a pulse ox screening and Sara failed at her foot, then again at 25 hours. She was rushed to the critical care unit.  They then did an echo and said they were going to send it to Children’s Hospital Colorado and if they didn’t hear back in a half an hour they were going to call them.  They got a call that there was something wrong with Sara’s heart and we were transferred to Children’s by the time Sara was 30 hours old.  A while after we arrived we received Sara’s diagnosis of an Interrupted Aortic Arch, type B1, Ventricular Septal Defect (VSD), Atrial Septal Defect (ASD) and Hypoplastic Aortic Valve and learned she would need open-heart surgery within days.  Sara had her first open heart surgery at nine days to repair her arch, patch her ASD and VSD, moving her valves and adding a pulmonary homograph.  We were in-patient for a month and we came home with a G-tube because of vocal cord paralysis. She had to have two catheter procedures and a stent placement before she was six months old. We had an uneventful couple of years and then she had started getting further narrowing in her artificial valve which was a sign that her next open-heart surgery was coming up.  Sara was three years old when she had her second open heart surgery in July of 2018.  Sara is now five and doing very well.  We know that she will need at least one more valve replacement.  I only left the hospital once in Sara’s first month and that was to attend the first Denver Superhero Heart Run.  There I was able to meet other heart families and know that I was not alone.
I order Sara’s personalized Heart Hero Cape and it hung for many years by her feeding pump until she was big enough to wear it.  She loves being a Heart Hero and attending the Superhero Heart Run!

written by Nonnie, Super Sara’s mom