Arkansas Teen Awaits Heart Transplant 3 Years After Surviving Bone Cancer: 'I've Been So Lucky' (Exclusive)

• MacKenzie Maddry, now 17, was diagnosed with bone cancer in her knee in 2020 and spent 100 days in hospital for cancer treatment
• Two years later, her family learned she had end-stage heart failure
• While she waits for a heart transplant, a left ventricular assist device (LVAD) is keeping her alive

MacKenzie Maddry has always loved sports. The eighth-grader ran track and cross country, and also played soccer. So when she told her parents in the fall of 2020 that her left leg hurt, they thought it was a sports-related injury.

“I noticed this lump on my leg and it just got bigger and more painful,” the teenager from Bella Vista, Arkansas, tells PEOPLE. “We just thought I pulled something.”

The lump was on the inside of her left thigh, right above the knee. And when she sat down – for example to play the viola – it became even more painful.

“I would go to the orchestra and sit down, and then it would take me a while to stand up and be able to straighten my leg. It was so bad,” says MacKenzie, now 17. “That’s when I thought, ‘Yeah, we definitely need to see a doctor about this.'”

MacKenzie Maddry.

MacKenzie Maddry

After seeing multiple doctors, she was referred to a hospital in Little Rock, where on December 17, 2020, she was diagnosed with osteosarcoma, a cancer that starts in the bones. About 400 children under the age of 20 are diagnosed each year, according to the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.

MacKenzie began 48 hours of chemotherapy on December 23 – spending Christmas morning in hospital. She had 21 cycles of chemotherapy over nine months before surgery to remove the tumor. A teenage girl spent almost 100 days in the hospital for cancer treatment.

“We were there three weeks a month because we have chemo one week, a week off, then chemo the next week and then the week after that,” MacKenzie says.

She remembers feeling very depressed. “It was really hard to deal with because all your friends are moving on with their lives and you’re fighting this terrible cancer,” she says. “My friends are there for me, but it’s hard when you have to put your life on hold while everyone else moves forward.”

MacKenzie Maddry shows the swelling on her leg.

Come on Maddry

A year after she finished chemotherapy, her surgery site became infected. She had three surgeries to clear the infection and reconstruct her femur, the last one on October 13, 2022.

But a few days later, she woke up in pain. “We assumed the leg pain was fine, but it just felt so tight, and there was a little bit of chest pain,” says MacKenzie.

Three days later, the chest pains became so severe that she was rushed to the hospital. She arrived with low blood pressure and a high heart rate. Soon after, doctors diagnosed him with end-stage heart failure.

Her mother remembers the moment she heard the diagnosis. “You think you’re getting the worst news ever with cancer,” says Dori Maddry, 43, a program manager at Walmart. “You are depressed. You can’t even think, ‘How are we going to get through this?’”

“If the doctors then tell you: ‘It’s the final stage of heart failure’ — you can’t get over that.”

MacKenzie Maddry.

Come on Maddry

Although MacKenzie was diagnosed with chemotherapy-induced cardiomyopathy in August 2021, everything was under control thanks to her blood pressure medication. “My heart was already under surveillance, but it was fine. It didn’t get worse until I had surgery on my leg,” she says. “It just progressed overnight.”

Unfortunately, since she had not yet reached the two-year cancer-free threshold, she was ineligible for a heart transplant. “We had to look for a long-term solution while I waited,” she says.

After several weeks of trying multiple medications to help her heart function, doctors decided the only way she would live to see her 17th birthday in September 2023 was to have a left ventricular assist device (LVAD) implanted in her chest. It helps pump blood from the heart’s lower left chamber — called the left ventricle — to the rest of the body, according to the Mayo Clinic. The device was surgically implanted on November 14, 2022.

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“It pumps my blood for me because my heart just doesn’t have the willpower to do it on its own right now. I’m technically still in heart failure because if you take the device out, it wouldn’t work very well on its own,” says MacKenzie.

However, she feels much better since getting the Abbott LVAD HeartMate 3. The device allowed her to go home from the hospital and wait for a new heart.

“It gave me back the energy I lost from chemotherapy,” she says. “I’m so grateful… Without it, I don’t know where I’d be.”

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MacKenzie Maddry.

Come on Maddry

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After spending a total of 297 in the hospital since December 2020, MacKenzie is now on the waiting list for a heart transplant.

“I was so lucky,” she says.

“When my mom gets phone calls, I always listen to make sure, because we met someone with an LVAD, and she has a son who got a heart transplant. And she said, ‘Make sure you record whenever they call you.'” ‘And I just thought it would be a great idea. So I always asked, ‘Do I have to come record this phone call?'” says MacKenzie.

While he waits for his new heart, a GoFundMe has been set up to help with medical expenses. She became an advocate and ambassador for the LVAD, sharing her story with other pediatric patients waiting for a heart.

“It’s so nice to meet people who know your struggle, what you’ve been going through,” she says.

She keeps a list of “tips and tricks” that she shares with other patients. And he shares his journey on Instagram.

MacKenzie Maddry.

Come on Maddry

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After getting a heart transplant, she hopes to be able to swim — she couldn’t last summer. She also set her sights on nursing school.

“I’m just excited about the next steps in my life,” she says.

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Source: HIS Education