Washington Week: Student Voices (O)

Cheneys donate to new George Washington U. heart center
By Sam Levenback
The Daily Colonial (George Washington U.)
03/07/2006

(U-WIRE) WASHINGTON — Vice President Dick Cheney is giving back to the hospital that saved his life.

The George Washington University Medical Faculty Associates and School of Medicine and Health Sciences announced Monday the establishment of the Richard B. and Lynne V. Cheney Cardiovascular Institute, which will be funded by a $2.7 million gift from the vice president and his wife.

"Lynne and I have been grateful for the first-rate care provided by the doctors at The George Washington University Medical Faculty Associates and we are pleased to support their efforts to advance the treatment of cardiac disease," Cheney is quoted as saying in a release.

The hospital said the mission of the cardiovascular institute will be "the advancement of research, education, and clinical care of cardiovascular disease." The institute will include clinicians and scientists in cardiology, radiology, cardiovascular surgery, biochemistry, molecular biology, and pharmacology. The first initiative will be the identifying the use significance of genomics and proteonomics in cardiovascular disease.

"The Cheney gift has provided us an opportunity to achieve these goals," said Dr. Richard Katz, director of the Division of Cardiology and the director of the Cardiovascular Institute.

"The MFA is deeply appreciative of this generous gift from the Vice President and Mrs. Cheney as their charitable contribution will enable us to do advanced research in cardiovascular disease," added Alan G. Wasserman, chairman of the Department of Medicine and president of the MFA.

Cheney has a lengthy history of heart trouble; he had his first heart attack at age 37. He had his second, third, and fourth heart attacks in 1984, 1988, and 2001, respectively. In 2001, he had a cardiac defibrillator implanted in his chest.

The vice president's treatment at the GW Hospital extends over three decades. In August 1988, Dr. Benjamin L. Aaron of the GW Hospital performed a four-vessel coronary bypass operation on Cheney two months after his third heart attack.

On Nov. 22, 2000, hours after learning that the Bush-Cheney victory was being threatened by the Florida Supreme Court's ruling backing recounts, Cheney awoke at 3 a.m. with chest discomfort. The Secret Service drove him to the GW Hospital where he arrived at 4:30 a.m. It was determined that the vice president-elect was having his fourth heart attack, albeit a small one, and physicians performed a balloon angioplasty and installed a stint in his chest.

Days after re-election in 2004, Cheney was taken to the Hospital after complaining of shortness of breath. After three hours of evaluation, he was released. In January of this year he was taken to the Hospital after complaining of shortness of breath.

The GW Hospital has a history with political leaders. It renamed its trauma center after President Ronald Reagan in 1991; the GW Hospital was where Reagan went after the 1981 assassination attempt and his life was saved by a team of physicians in emergency surgery.

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