Now, that height would be reducing his chances of survival.
Pollard needs a heart transplantan already delicate procedure, which is further complicated by the fact that very few donors can provide him with such a large and strong organ to supply blood to his large six-foot, 11-inch (2.10 meter) body.
He was admitted to intensive care on Tuesday at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, where he will wait until a donor tall enough to be a match emerges.
“I’m staying here until I receive a heart,” the former athlete said in a text message sent Wednesday night to The Associated Press. ”My heart became weak. “The doctors agree that this is my best chance to receive a heart faster.”
Pollard’s size rules out most potential donors for a heart to replace his. The former player suffers from a genetic condition that was worsened by a virus he contracted in 2021.
Your heart beats an additional 10,000 times per day. Half of his siblings have the same condition, as does his father, who died at age 54, when Scott was 16.
“That was a red flag,” said Pollard, who weighed 260 pounds (118 kilograms) when he played and who also spoke in a recent telephone interview. “You don’t see many people this size walking around, so I’ve known my whole life, just from the fact that this was drilled into my brain at 16, that being that tall is a good thing, but “I may not live to be 80.”
Selected in the first round of the 1997 draft after helping Kansas reach the NCAA Sweet 16 in four consecutive seasons, Pollard was useful as a backup center for much of a career that spanned 11 years in five equipment.
He played 55 seconds in the Cleveland Cavaliers’ trip to the NBA Finals in 2007 and won it all the following year with the Celtics, despite an ankle injury that ended his season in February.
Pollard retired after that season. He tried his luck as a commentator and actor. He was a contestant on the 32nd edition of “Survivor,” from which voting eliminated him on the 27th day, when there were eight contestants left on the simulated reality show.
At 48, Pollard has been aware of his condition at least since the 1990s, when his father died. But it wasn’t until three years ago, when he himself became ill, that it began to affect his quality of life.
“It feels like I’m walking uphill all the time,” he said in the phone call, warning a reporter that he might need to cut the conversation short if he ran out of steam.
Pollard tried medications. He underwent three ablations—procedures intended to cut off the signals that cause cardiac arrhythmia. A pacemaker implanted a year ago only solves about half of the problem.
“Everyone agrees that more ablations are not going to fix this, nor are more medications,” Pollard said. “We need a transplant.”
Patients who need a transplant have to navigate a tangled system that searches for the most compatible donated organ for the recipient in need. The matching process takes into account the patient’s health, with the goal of maximizing the benefit of the limited organs available.
“It’s not in my hands, not even in the doctors’ hands,” Pollard said. “It all depends on donor networks.”
Source: AP
