Teen stays awake during heart surgery, helping doctors find abnormal heartbeat

By Madisen Keavy

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    ROSEVILLE, California (KOVR) — A Roseville teen with a big heart is a shining example of bravery, if you ask his family and the medical team he has worked with closely since August.

Eian Long, 16, is being praised by his doctors for successfully staying awake during the entirety of a three-hour heart surgery as they fed wires into his heart to track down the source of his arrhythmia, or abnormal heartbeat. It is a search that can be like finding a needle in a haystack.

“It is pretty rare to have the severity of the arrhythmia Eian had,” said Dr. Scott Ceresnak, director of Pediatric Electrophysiology and Arrhythmia at Stanford Medicine Children’s Health. “Sometimes when the patient goes to sleep, the arrhythmia goes to sleep too. So being awake definitely increases the chance you can find the arrhythmia and effectively get rid of it.”

Eian’s parents, Brandon and Price Long, took him to what they thought would be a routine, annual check-in with his pediatrician when he was 15 years old.

The pediatrician noticed an irregularity in his heartbeat and from then on, everything changed. They learned his heart was not beating normally, but sprinting at a marathon pace.

There were no obvious signs leading up to this point that something was wrong with Eian’s heart as he was seemingly perfectly healthy.

“With it being so silent, the worst-case scenario is that his heart would fail,” said Price, Eian’s mother.

Price said after the diagnosis, it made more sense as to why Eian was at times lethargic and unable to participate in physical activity for a long period of time.

“It began to make sense at the end of it because if your heart is always on a marathon your body is gonna feel tired,” said Price.

After medications failed to solve the problem, Eian and his family opted for a surgical procedure as a last resort.

When the doctors told him and his family that staying awake during the procedure would greatly impact their success in finding the problem, it was then that Eian chose to be strong.

“We said, ‘If you do this awake, it will really help them out.’ And he was like, ‘OK, let’s do it,'” said Brandon, Eian’s father.

“My parents gave me that confidence and the doctors. When it did come, I was brave,” added Eian. “I was nervous, I was preparing for it, I was thinking about it every day just trying to work through it.”

Enduring a three-hour procedure as doctors fed wires into his heart to find and eliminate the rare irregularity, Eian was awake and alert the entire time.

“It’s pretty rare we have to do that, especially in a younger patient. It’s really a kudos to him to be able to do that is pretty remarkable,” said Ceresnak.

Eian’s medical team even had him watching his favorite movies during the procedure to keep him distracted.

“What can happen is these extra beats can cause the heart muscle to weaken, to not be able to squeeze as effectively as it should,” said Ceresnak.

Because Eian’s heart muscle weakened and its function was starting to deteriorate, Dr. Ceresnak acted quickly to perform the procedure Aug. 2, 2024.

“I think if that wasn’t picked up on the earlier side he could have come to the point where he was in heart failure and had other arrhythmias and other challenges,” said Ceresnak.

Eian’s surgery was a massive success, and he was instantly able to notice the difference in his heart.

“After, I asked him, ‘Buddy how do you feel?’ He sat there, took inventory of his body, put his hand to his heart, and said, ‘My heart is slow,'” said Price.

Now, more than six months post-op, Eian’s heart has had no irregular or extra heartbeats since.

“It’s steady. That’s the way it should be. I think he has been able to rest so much after this,” said Price.

Eian’s family and medical team are confident he will make a full recovery.

“For him, I think it’s pretty likely this will stay away. Which is also a testament to him staying awake through this procedure, maximizing the chance this could be successful for him,” said Ceresnak.

With what feels like a new heart, Eian is able to do things he hasn’t before like play a game of basketball with his parents and younger brother.

At 16, he now has a new love for life.

“I feel very different. It’s a lot more exercise, playing sports that I never really played,” said Eian.

With that, his entire family of five has found a new perspective on life — that health is our greatest wealth.

“I will take the mundane of every single day if it means I get to have my son with me. If it means we get to be his parents and walk this side of heaven with him. I will take the mundane of every day if it comes with his presence and his health,” said Price.

“We don’t know what could happen at the end of the day. But every day I get to spend, come home to these guys is a blessing all in itself,” added Brandon.

Considering February is National Heart Month, Eian’s family and the team at Stanford Medicine Children’s Health feel this story should serve as a reminder to all parents to make sure their children are getting annual check-ups with their doctor, even if they seem perfectly fine.

“Once a year I would encourage parents to make it a point, take your child in. They can be healthy as a horse. Some of these things can be very silent. That’s the point of preventative care,” said Price.

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