GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Alecia Cosey awoke slumped behind the wheel, her teenage daughter in tears beside her.
“Momma, are you OK?” her daughter, Dayshai, asked, clinging to the steering wheel. “Did your heart stop?”
Alecia, then 37, remembered nothing of the April 5, 2015 drive to church—only the racing heartbeat before she blacked out. It was one of several near-death episodes she had endured since 2002, when doctors diagnosed her with heart failure at age 25.
Her battle spanned more than two decades. She survived multiple cardiac episodes thanks to implanted defibrillators, underwent several device implantations, and even faced a severe case of sepsis. In the end, it was a heart transplant—performed at UF Health—that gave her a second chance at life and marked a milestone in U.S. medical history.
The diagnosis was devastating. Alecia was a young mother, and the condition that now threatened her life was the same one that had claimed her father’s at just 36. She feared her fate would mirror his.
“Knowing that he had passed away so young, I honestly thought, ‘I only have 10 years of life left,’” Alecia said. “I was going to die young. Who was going to take care of my daughter? She was just 5 at the time.”
Her fears were not unfounded. Her heart’s ability to pump blood had dropped to just 10% of normal. The symptoms were crippling. The emotional toll of believing her time was running out added to the burden.
Alecia’s survival and recovery were made possible by three critical factors: her unrelenting determination, the unwavering support of her family, and advanced, life-saving care at UF Health. Her treatment included groundbreaking surgical interventions and medical devices, culminating in a transplant that placed her in the annals of U.S. transplant history.
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