This 28-year-old was studying nursing at Palomar College, then he became the patient

A 28-year-old man is heading home from Sharp Memorial Hospital on Thursday after receiving a heart transplant. However, what makes him so remarkable is not only his grit, but what he did during his stay.

“I never thought this would happen,” Austin Nabors said. “[It’s] probably the last thing I would have expected.”

Nabors told NBC 7 he called 911 earlier this year when he felt fluid building up in his lungs. He was not comfortable driving his car because of the symptoms he was experiencing, so he was taken to Tri-City Medical Center.

“I felt like I was kind of drowning,” Nabors said.

Once the Vista native arrived, he was told he had respiratory failure and was intubated for a couple of days to help his lungs. After a short stay, Nabors was transferred to Sharp Memorial Hospital, then discharged after receiving some care with the hopes that his breathing would improve.

However, he said it kept getting worse and he had to return to the emergency department several weeks ago. That’s when he learned his next step.

“I read it on the medical report previously that they may need to consider heart transplantation, but I thought that it was kind of one of those things, you know, like a fine print thing,” Nabors said.

It’s something he told NBC 7 he thought he would never need to do. He was told that he would need a heart transplant, and was put on the list to wait for one.

“I was extremely surprised and I didn’t know what to think at first because it was sort of shocking,” Nabors said.

But, despite the shock at the news, Nabors is no stranger to the field of medicine. 

He was a student, now a proud graduate, at Palomar College and enrolled in their nursing program. It is a two-year curriculum that he was in the thick of when his health scare first happened. 

“It’s unique to have someone with a medical background and medical education go through it,” Dr. Hirsch Mehta, M.D., a cardiologist at Sharp Memorial Hospital, said. 

Nabors received a heart transplant about one week ago. While he was waiting, rather than drop out of school, he had the help from his care team, friends, family and Palomar College professors to complete all requirements.

“We reviewed quite a bit that I don’t think I would have gone over if I weren’t in the ICU,” Nabors said.

The team at Sharp Memorial helped Nabors get more clinical hours needed for his program. They also held his pinning ceremony, signifying successful completion of nursing school, at the hospital. An experience, he said, that will change the way he approaches his career.

“Now that I’ve been a patient, I think that you kind of get more sympathy for patients and I think that I will probably hear their requests a little bit better,” Nabors said.

Nabors will need frequent testing over the next few months to ensure the transplanted heart is functioning properly, but, as of now, Dr. Mehta told NBC 7 it is looking good, and Nabors has a bright future ahead of him.

“You have to have resolve and you have to have perseverance and you have to have a little faith to go into and come out of this entire process,” Dr. Mehta said, “But then to finish schooling, which on its own is tough, I think it just adds another layer to his resolve.”