New Heart: One Man's Journey of Being a Heart Transplant Recipient

Dion Perry's doctor initially suspected he had asthma upon hearing he did not feel well. So, he was sent to the local hospital for a chest X-ray and a lung function test. The results were definitive: He did not have asthma. The mystery was solved when his doctor placed her fingers on his wrist to feel his pulse. She told him his heart was beating out of step before returning with a senior doctor, who gave him a referral to a cardiologist. A few days later, the author was breathlessly trying to chainsaw up, split, and stack some wood from some logs he'd dropped in the yard a couple of months prior. Later that afternoon, not feeling well, he went to see an acupuncturist who wanted to take him straight to Goulburn Hospital. Instead, he went home, only to be phoned by a doctor who sent an ambulance to pick him up. It was the beginning of a journey with lots of twists and turns that left him with a new heart more than two years later.