Joliet man receives 5-organ transplant, including 2nd liver

Phillip Hanks of Joliet excused himself from a consultation with doctors and headed for the restroom.

The team of doctors had just told Phillip he needed a five-organ transplant. Phillip’s wife Tiva Hanks has anxiety, so Phillip always tries to remain stoic and calm in front of her, he said.

But once inside the restroom, Phillip said he “had a meltdown” and asked God, “Is this the end?” And Phillip said he felt God respond, “Why would I leave you now?” Phillip then returned to the meeting.

It’s not quite three months since Phillip had 11 hours of surgery over two days to receive his new organs and he’s eager to return to body-building. But Phillip, who is currently taking 10 to 12 medications a day and being weaned off several, is heeding his doctor’s advice to wait a year before performing heavy exercises.

The first transplant

Phillip was diagnosed with diabetes in 2005 and met Tiva in 2006; they became engaged in 2007. When the diabetes first appeared, Phillip attributed his fatigue to his 12-hour work shifts.

Yet once the diabetes was under control, Phillip’s weight began to drop - from 317 to 285 – and his workouts went from five days a week to two, he said.

“I was just that tired,” Phillip said.

Then Phillip had a cheek swab as part of increasing his life insurance policy. He learned his liver enzymes were “off,” so his doctors ran some testes. Phillip had hepatitis C – and a resterilized needle from a tattoo in 2003 was blamed.

Phillip had a liver culture – where a long needle is “jabbed” into the liver to remove tissue – and shortly afterward Phillip developed symptoms typically associated with hepatitis C: yellowing of the eyes and generalized itching, he said.

Treatment for the hepatitis C only slowed the progression, Phillip said. He was diagnosed with stage four liver cancer and was placed on a transplant list. Phillip then tried to break up with Tiva so he wouldn’t “be a burden to her,” he said.

Tiva refused.

“I respected that, but I loved him,” Tiva said. “But when we got married, he was very sick. He was on the list, but we really did not know what the future held.”

In fact, Phillip had a brother who died of kidney failure while awaiting his transplant.

Phillip received a liver transplant on Nov. 11, 2007, and the recovery was filled with complications. Tiva said the new liver had an extra valve that “bled out,” so Phillip was “rushed back” into surgery. Then he went into kidney failure, spent a week and half in an induced coma and even had his spleen removed, she said.

But Tiva had a surprise for Phillip when he woke up: a pair of baby booties. Their daughter Aliya is now 13.

“It was about a year and a half when I started going back to work and things got back to normal,” Phillip said.

That all changed in 2019.

The road to becoming a new man

In December of 2019, Phillip was playing basketball with family when he felt a pain shoot up his arm and down his back. Figuring he’d pulled a muscle; Phillip took some ibuprofen. As the pain intensified, Phillip took more ibuprofen until he couldn’t move without crying, he said.

Finally, Tiva took Phillip to the emergency room, he said. The news was not good. Phillip needed a new liver, and he was in fourth stage kidney failure.

Phillip said he consulted with specialists who balked at redoing the liver transplant because of the scar tissue. Finally, Phillip was referred to Dr. Richard Mangus, a transplant surgeon at Indiana University Health and learned he needed a new liver and kidney as well as a pancreas, stomach, and small intestine and bowel, too.

But after meeting Mangus, Phillip said he felt, “If Dr. Mangus couldn’t do this, nobody could. He was extremely humble and honest.”

Phillip went on the transplant list on New Year’s Eve. Two weeks before the start of the pandemic, Phillip lost his job. Several days before his 50th birthday, Phillip got “the call.” As they drove to the hospital, Tiva, unbeknownst to him, was contacting loved ones and canceling his surprise party.

However, one of the organs “not being quite right” and the transplant was canceled, Phillip said. So Tiva let everyone know the party was back on, she said. The day after the party, Phillip once again received “the call.”

The reason for a 5-organ transplant

Mangus said the vein supplying the blood flow to the liver was obstructed and affecting Phillip’s other organs, Mangus said.

Removing the organs as a unit and replacing them as a unit was “conceptually simpler” than replacing each one individually, although Phillip being in kidney failure added to the risk of the multivisceral transplant, Mangus said.

Still, Phillip didn’t resemble patients Mangus typically sees.

“They’re debilitated, malnourished, thin, frail,” Mangus said. “They’ve lost a lot of muscle mass. They don’t have good quality physiology to work with. He [Phillip] had gone out of his way to take care of himself. He exercised, ate well. He looked quote robust and healthy.”

The difference continued after the transplant, Mangus said.

“Some of these patients spend two, three, four months in the hospital recovering,” Mangus said. “He did remarkably well because he was in such good shape. The surgery went smoothly, and we got excellent organs. I think all that helps.”

Hero in the background

While Phillip was handling the health challenges, Tiva was handling everything else.

During his first transplant, the family consisted of Phillip’s sons from his first marriage (Cammeren 7 and Collier, 5), Tiva’s children Alyssa, 6 and Deon, 8. They were also raising Tiva’s 14-year-old brother after Tiva’s mother died.

“While all this was going on,” Tiva earned her master’s degree. Phillip proudly added that Tiva also made the dean’s list.

“I don’t think people realize that, as a caregiver, we’re in the trenches,” Tiva said. “I’m still a mom and a teacher and I’m still doing everything else. That doesn’t go away just because my husband is sick.”

Now – and the future

Phillip is now adjusting to life on disability and the freedom of not counting carbohydrates since he’s no longer diabetic. He and Tiva are expectant grandparents. He was recently ordained a minster through the National Association of Christian Ministers and is currently taking chaplain classes.

HE hopes to serve as a hospital chaplain and an inspirational speaker, so people know “anything is possible through God.”