Poplar Bluff brothers 'code' simultaneously in hospital ER

POPLAR BLUFF, Mo. -- Life is stranger than fiction, agree one Poplar Bluff family and the staff at Poplar Bluff Regional Medical Center.

The Lacy family and staff at the medical center will remember March 3 for a long time as the day brothers Crocket and Ronnie Lacy went into cardiac arrest at the same time in the emergency room. For Crocket, it was the second time that day he had coded. For Ronnie, it was his first, but not his last.

Crocket, 53, a disabled truck driver, was not feeling well and had gone to the doctor. He became impatient and left before he was treated.

Before going to the doctor, Crocket called his youngest brother Ronnie, who lives in Bell City, Mo. Ronnie arrived at Crocket's home about 10 minutes before Crocket coded.

Ronnie and Crocket's wife, Karen, called 911 and started CPR, Eric said. Ronnie's chest was hurting, so when Poplar Bluff police officer Jerry Cates arrived, he took over CPR, Eric said.

When emergency medical services personnel showed up, they got Crocket's heartbeat back and headed for the hospital, Eric said.

The family had spent about 10 to 15 minutes at the hospital where the emergency room staff was working on Crocket when Ronnie had his heart attack.

"They went code blue at the same time and both were revived at the same time," Eric said.

Ronnie had triple bypass surgery that night and was feeling well enough to enjoy his 48th birthday March 5.

"Everything is going as planned for Ronnie," brother Eric Lacy said.

Eric said Crocket, who was on life support for a while, is improving, but the family realizes the heart specialists cannot do anything until his kidneys are functioning properly again.

"It will be days or weeks; it will be a long drawn-out deal on him," Eric said.

Having two brothers suffer heart attacks at the same time was a rarity for the medical staff.

Emergency room registered nurse Brad Davis has seen his share of trauma. He also works in emergency medical services in the field.

"We were taking care of one brother who had a heart attack and his brother who was having chest pains was in a different exam room," Davis said. "Occasionally, family members become ill when they have someone in the emergency room, but it is unusual for them to have a life-threatening event at the same time."

Ronnie was fortunate to have had his heart attack while in the emergency room. It allowed his care to be managed appropriately, Davis said.

Monitors for each patient are in a central location in the ER, so Davis saw both of the brothers' monitors go into the same fatal rhythm simultaneously.

It gets "hectic enough running a regular emergency room," but it takes a team to manage a code, Davis said. It "took more than one staff member to stabilize Crocket."

Davis said in his 13 years in the medical field, he's never experienced a day like that before. "That was a bizarre day where the outcome is the brothers are doing OK. It was a really positive, encouraging day, but a reminder to pay attention" to the warning signs of a heart attack.

Once Ronnie was stabilized, the ER staff transferred him to the catheterization lab, where Dr. Rubima Mirza and her team began working on him. They soon realized he needed surgery. Mirza called Poplar Bluff Regional Medical Center cardiac surgeon Dr. Stanley Ziomek.

Ziomek was finishing heart surgery on a patient when he received a call from Mirza explaining they had a patient needing to undergo surgery immediately. The goal of the two doctors was to keep Ronnie alive until Ziomek completed the surgery he was performing.

Mirza placed a stent in one of Ronnie's three blocked arteries and defibrillated him again, allowing Ziomek time to complete the surgery on his first patient before performing a triple bypass on Ronnie.

"Life is stranger than fiction," said Ziomek, describing the Lacy family's experience as a "very traumatic incident."

Ziomek describes the coordination between the medical staff as "a remarkable thing," adding it was "a good team effort between the frontline in the ER, cath lab and to our staff. It was all hands on deck."

Ziomek said in 50 percent of people, the first heart attack is massive and can be fatal.

Ziomek was impressed not only with the hospital's staff, but with the Lacy brothers' family devotion and concern. He said there were at least 20 family members in the waiting room most of the time. "It is not uncommon to see this kind of family support in Poplar Bluff," he said.

Several family members kept a vigil at the hospital for several days. Other siblings include Dennis, who is the oldest and lives in Bell City, David and Bertha Jean Hancock, who both live in Poplar Bluff. and Gary, who also lives in Southeast Missouri.

In the last few months, Ziomek and the hospital staff have seen two to three other dramatic cases of sudden heart attacks where the patients would not have survived being transferred. "Fortunately, we saved them all," Ziomek said. "I really think this shows the hospital has some really good people who really care, as well as state of the art equipment. Without quick action and treatment, the Lacy brothers might not have survived."

Ziomek stressed everyone should "take any kind of chest pain seriously and get it checked out. It can be the tip of an iceberg."