Logan Lucado, 10, Went Into Cardiac Arrest at His Tennessee Middle School After a Fire Drill, and Weeks Later a Donor Heart Arrived at Vanderbilt

A fire alarm glitch sent Whitthorne Middle School outside for a drill on Sept. 4. Soon after, 10-year-old Logan Lucado had collapsed in his classroom, been revived by school nurses and firefighters, and been airlifted to Vanderbilt. Over the next six weeks he was resuscitated twice more, kept alive by machines, placed on the transplant list and given a new heart, and on Oct. 15 he was discharged from the hospital.

The timeline comes from reporting by WSMV in Nashville and WVLT in Knoxville, published Oct. 21 and based largely on an interview with Logan’s mother, Ashley Danielle Hailey. The stations did not independently verify the medical details, and this account attributes them accordingly.

The Collapse in His Classroom

Logan, who lives in Columbia, Tennessee, was in his IEP classroom after the drill when he slumped over, WSMV reported. His teacher at first thought he was adjusting his shoe. When he did not respond after his name was called three times, staff realized something was wrong.

Hailey told the station she got a call at 8:15 a.m. saying he had passed out. School nurses began CPR and gave four breaths before he started breathing again, but an officer found he had no pulse. Fire department personnel restored his pulse within four minutes, according to the report.

Hailey also credited the school. “The school has been amazing,” she said, according to WVLT’s version of the story.

The American Heart Association’s CPR facts and statistics page says immediate CPR can double or triple the chance of survival from an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest. The page also reports that more than 350,000 such arrests occur in the United States each year, and that 40.2% of the 356,000-plus out-of-hospital arrests in 2023 received bystander CPR. In Logan’s case, nurses inside the school started CPR before his pulse was restored by fire department personnel, according to WSMV.

Stabilized in Maury County, Then an Airlift to Nashville

Logan was first stabilized at Maury Regional Hospital, where doctors said he had gone into cardiac arrest, WVLT reported. He was then airlifted to Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt in Nashville.

Hailey said Logan went into cardiac arrest two more times after the helicopter landed, and neither happened during the flight. Both times he was resuscitated.

The hospital’s heart transplant program page says its cardiac surgeons perform more than 500 operations a year. It also says the hospital operates Tennessee’s first ECMO-capable pediatric transport service, and that its program treats children with congenital heart defects and acquired heart disease, including cardiomyopathy.

Hailey also shared a piece of Logan’s history with the stations. She said he had a heart attack during his birth in 2015 that led to dilated cardiomyopathy, and that doctors gave him 12 hours to live at the time. Those details are her account and were not independently confirmed.

Days on ECMO and a Pump Inside His Heart

Once at Vanderbilt, Logan was placed on ECMO for several days, according to WSMV. A Vanderbilt University Medical Center article on another young patient describes ECMO as “a life-sustaining mechanical system” and an Impella as a catheter-based miniature ventricular assist device.

On Sept. 8 or 9, doctors performed a heart catheterization and inserted an Impella device in Logan’s heart, Hailey told the stations. He was extubated and, by the stations’ account, improving.

The recovery then hit a snag. Logan had a severe nosebleed that required nasal packing, and he was re-intubated for several days. Once the bleeding stopped, he was extubated again.

Vanderbilt’s page says the hospital’s ECMO program dates to 1989 and is the only one of its kind in Middle Tennessee. Each shift is staffed with at least three ECMO specialists, the page says.

On the Transplant List, Then a Saturday Call

Doctors placed Logan on the heart transplant list the following Thursday, according to the reports. The stations did not give the date of that Thursday.

The Mayo Clinic’s overview of dilated cardiomyopathy describes it as a heart muscle disease in which the ventricles thin and stretch, making it harder for the heart to pump blood. The page says treatment may involve medications or devices, and that “sometimes, a heart transplant is needed.”

On a Saturday at 5:42 p.m., Hailey was told a heart matching Logan’s O-negative blood type had been found, the stations reported. The reports do not give the date of that Saturday, only that it was in October.

Surgery on a Sunday Night and the Discharge

Logan’s transplant surgery took place Sunday night into Monday, according to WSMV and WVLT. Neither report gave exact dates for the operation, which happened in October.

He was discharged from the hospital on Oct. 15, the stories said. WVLT’s report, published Oct. 21, said he returned home the following week. That left roughly six weeks between the fire drill on Sept. 4 and the day he left Vanderbilt.

The stations described a long road for a boy who, by his mother’s account, had already beaten difficult odds at birth. Hailey told WSMV that she wants people to know about his journey and what she called a big miracle.

The Vanderbilt program page says the heart transplant team offers lifelong follow-up care after a transplant. Its care team includes transplant coordinators, social workers, child life specialists and pediatric pharmacists, among others. The page adds that the Vanderbilt Transplant Center reported a record fiscal year with 981 solid organ transplants.

Get stories like this by email. Sign up for The Parent Diaries Letter.

This article was produced with AI assistance and edited for accuracy against the sources linked above.

Image: SenatorDF – CC BY-SA 3.0/Wikimedia Commons