Jeff Pollier

Living on bonus time: Jeff Pollier’s story of survival, CPR and the importance of heart care

On a warm evening in Sun City, Jeff and Robin Pollier were doing what they have loved for decades, tending to their garden at their plot in the community garden. Gardening has always been part of their story.
 

“My wife and I, we’ve always had gardens,” Jeff said. “The good thing about gardening is you do it with your loved ones. You’re doing it with your family.”

This year marks 35 years of marriage for Jeff and Robin. They met, dated for a couple of years and built a life rooted in love, family and simple joys like planting vegetables side by side.

But on October 19, that ordinary day in the garden became anything but ordinary.

A sudden collapse

The couple had been preparing their plot, setting up beds and planting to get ready for the growing season. Robin glanced over to where Jeff had been standing.

“I looked over at him and I didn’t see him. He wasn’t standing up anymore,” said Robin.

Jeff had collapsed.

“I actually went down, had a heart attack,” Jeff says. “I don’t remember any of it.”

Robin does.

“I’m shaking him and his eyes are open. He’s gurgling. I just started yelling for help.”

A couple was walking nearby. One of those walkers was Sharon Gibbs, director of critical care at HCA Florida Brandon Hospital. She heard a bang and a thud and turned around to see what happened.

“As I looked up, that’s when I saw Jeff had dropped to the floor.”

She rushed over. Jeff had no pulse.

“We started CPR,” Sharon said. “They brought the AED machine. I attached the AED pads. Shocked him.”

Jeff was in cardiac arrest. His heart had stopped.

“He was definitely not with us anymore,” said Sharon.

Robin remembers. “His lips were blue. It was awful. It was just horrible. I really did think he was going to die.”

But CPR kept blood flowing to his brain. The AED, a portable automated external defibrillator, delivered a lifesaving shock to restart his heart. Within minutes, emergency medical services arrived and transported him to HCA Florida South Shore Hospital just a mile down the road from the garden.

Those immediate actions: recognizing cardiac arrest, starting CPR and using an AED, made all the difference.

A race against time

At South Shore, doctors performed a cardiac catheterization. The results were serious.

Jeff was transferred for advanced cardiac care after testing revealed extensive disease in all three major coronary arteries supplying his heart.

While Jeff fought for his life, Robin faced a different kind of battle, waiting.

“The doctor said, ‘You go home, get some rest.’ I didn’t even want to go to bed because I didn’t want the phone to ring. I didn’t want to wake up to a phone telling me that he had passed,” said Robin as she fought through tears.

Instead, a team led by heart surgeon Dr. Ignacio Duarte prepared for complex bypass surgery.

Restoring the heart

“What we do is bypasses,” Dr. Duarte explained. “We reroute blood flow to go beyond the blockage, downstream from the blockage, into the heart artery so it can send new oxygen and blood to the heart muscle.”

Coronary artery bypass grafting creates new pathways for blood to reach areas of the heart that were starved of oxygen. In Jeff’s case, with three major vessels blocked, surgery was critical. But it was his recovery that truly astonished even his physicians.

“His story is pretty remarkable,” Dr. Duarte said. “It’s really just a miracle the way he recovered so quickly.”

For the critical care team, moments like these are why they do what they do.

“Seeing our patients come in in their worst moments in their lives,” Sharon said, “and then we get them to hopefully their best place that they can be and then get back home to their families.”

A reunion and a miracle

A couple months later, Jeff and Robin met Sharon back in the garden.

“Seeing Sharon again today, I just want to give her a hug,” he said. “Just to thank her for saving my life.”

Sharon smiled at the memory of that day.

“What are the odds that she happened to be here?” Robin said. “She’s a cardiac nurse. That’s a miracle that she was there and jumped in. It’s just crazy.”

Sharon would be the first to say it was not just luck. It was preparation. It was training. It was access to an AED. It was people willing to act.

The power of CPR and AEDs

Cardiac arrest can happen anywhere to anyone. When the heart stops, every second counts. Brain injury can begin within minutes. CPR helps maintain blood flow. An AED can restore a normal rhythm. Together, they dramatically increase the chance of survival.

Jeff is living proof. Today, Jeff feels stronger than he ever imagined he would after such a life threatening event.

“It’s hard for me to envision that I’m as good as I am,” he said. “I can’t imagine it could go better. All I can really say is thank you. Thank you for being there.”

After 35 years of marriage, Robin still has her partner and father to her children beside her in the garden.

For Jeff, every day now feels like a gift.

“Everything went extremely well,” he said. “I’m living on bonus time.”

Because of CPR, an AED and a team dedicated to heart care, he gets to keep planting, growing and living alongside the love of his life.