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Obituary

Crystal Bermudez, transplant patient waiting on donor

By CRAIG BASSE
Published September 16, 2005

LARGO - With a hole in her heart and desperate for new lungs, Crystal Bermudez still had high hopes.

The 28-year-old Largo woman was at the top of the list for a lung transplant. She and her husband, Gilbert, a Marine Corps veteran, had moved to Jacksonville three weeks ago to be near St. Luke's Hospital, a Mayo Clinic hospital.

During the surgery doctors there also planned to patch her heart.

But as she waited for a donor her heart stopped, said her mother, Elizabeth Kraft of Pinellas Park, Thursday.

Crystal Bermudez, whose struggle for a transplant was featured in an April St. Petersburg Times article, died Wednesday morning, her husband said. "The hospital did all it could," he said.

She died "quickly and painlessly," doctors told the family.

"Her breathing was getting worse," Kraft said of her daughter's final days. "She was trying to catch her breath all the time."

Family members gathered at the hospital Tuesday night, her husband said.

When they were about to leave, "She woke up and was really alert for a little bit," he said. "She was able to look at everyone there. She was able to see us all. She comprehended that we loved her. We went home to let her rest."

Crystal Bermudez, a native of Toledo, Ohio, who moved to Largo in November, had congenital cyanotic heart disease with pulmonary hypertension, right ventricular failure, left ventricular cardiomyopathy and severe cyanosis.

In short, she had a hole in her heart, a condition she was born with.

In January, she learned that she needed a new heart and a pair of lungs. In May, she was put on a national list, along with about 165 people waiting for heart-lung transplants.

Heart-lung donations are given based on the location of the person to a matching organ and the severity of the person's condition. Her critical condition moved her to the top of the list, her mother said.

Last year, 39 heart-lung transplants were performed in the United States, according to the United Network for Organ Sharing.

Besides her husband and mother, Crystal Bermudez is survived by her stepfather, Jerry Kraft, Pinellas Park; her father, Eddy C. Stripling Sr.; a brother, Eddy C. Stripling Jr.; and two sisters, Tiffany and Stephanie Lynn Stripling, all of Toledo; and her maternal grandmother, Janet Smith, Pinellas Park.

Friends may call at 9:30 a.m. Saturday at Abbey Affordable Cremation and Funeral Services, 12541 Ulmerton Road, Largo. A service will be at 10:30 a.m. Burial will be at Calvary Catholic Cemetery, Clearwater.

Information from Times files was used in this obituary.

[Last modified September 16, 2005, 01:36:17]