Three months after her collapse and cardiac arrest, Nicole Taylor, 25, ran a 5K race in 30 minutes
HACKETTSTOWN -- A Hackettstown woman says her adult daughter nearly died as a result of having her wisdom teeth removed in January by a Morris County dentist, John Vecchione, who was linked in a state report to 15 cases of bacterial endocarditis, a heart infection.
MaryAnn Taylor and her 25-year-old daughter, Nicole, said they and their doctors had no idea what caused the healthy young woman's heart to stop beating in April, until they read news accounts about Vecchione on Wednesday.
After learning that another patient, Ryan Del Grosso, 25, of Jefferson had fainting spells after being treated by Vecchione, "I thought that's exactly what happened to Nikki," her mother said.
In a report issued last month and widely reported this week, the state Department of Health said 15 patients, including one who died, developed the heart infection after undergoing intravenous sedation for oral surgery at Vecchione's offices between 2012 and 2014.
Meanwhile, Vecchione continues to treat patients at his offices in Mount Olive and Parisppany. Although the state Board of Dentistry identified several procedures that needed to be changed -- involving sterilization of instruments and preparation of medication -- the board said he could could continue to practice because he "voluntarily" agreed to its orders to improve his protocols.
Vecchione has declined several requests for comment this week.
While there has not been a formal diagnosis of endocarditis or any other ailment for Nicole Taylor, mother and daughter are convinced that's the explanation, considering that the healthy young woman didn't have any heart issues before.
"My friends were shocked when they heard about this," Nicole Taylor said.
Nicole collapsed while at work in April and went into cardiac arrest, and later suffered seizures after she was taken to Morristown Medical Center, her mother said.
Medical personnel "basically said she was dead and put her in a medically induced coma," MaryAnn Taylor said.
Two days later, though, following constant cardiopulmonary resuscitation and other treatments, Nicole woke up without brain damage, something the doctors had predicted had a "1 percent chance of happening," her mother said.
Although doctors there still had "no idea" what happened to her, "they said they had seen a bacteria in her blood that usually comes from mouths or teeth," MaryAnn Taylor said.
As for Nicole Taylor, she said she feels fine now. The athletic young woman, who has a 3-year-old son, ran a 5K race in 30 minutes last month.
She said she doesn't "remember anything" about the day she nearly died, but has plenty of memories of feeling sick and weak during the time between her dental surgery and her collapse.
Nicole said the experience had an odd feeling for her starting when Vecchione removed all four of her wisdom teeth in just 15 minutes -- something she thought should have taken an hour.
Nicole said she felt little pain immediately afterwards, but four or five days later, the pain intensified.
Then, a month or two after that, she began feeling ill and weak and was "in bed a lot. I thought I was getting a cold or whatever," she said.
In April, her mother recalled, Nicole fainted three times and her mother took her to Hackettstown Medical Center.
"They couldn't find anything," her mother said. "They thought it was just stress or overwork."
Both mother and daughter work at Sunrise House in Lafayette, Sussex County, a drug and alcohol treatment center, where MaryAnn is director of human resources and her daughter is the alumni coordinator. After her collapse, Nicole was taken by helicopter to Morristown Medical Center.
During her fall, Nicole broke four teeth and on Tuesday, she visited Vecchione to plan the process of repairing those teeth.
Her mother said that when she told Vecchione about her daughter's ordeal, "He looked like a deer in the headlights."
Now, both say, they understand what triggered that reaction, and they plan to get the dental work done elsewhere.
Meanwhile, MaryAnn Taylor said, they are busy preparing for a legal battle against Vecchione.
They have requested all the medical records from both the Hackettstown and Morristown hospitals, and will be filing a complaint with the dentistry board.
They have a meeting scheduled next week with James Lynch, the attorney who is representing Del Grosso and others in what is expected to become a class-action lawsuit against Vecchione.
"I don't want this happening to any other mothers," MaryAnn Taylor said.
Ben Horowitz may be reached at bhorowitz@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @HorowitzBen. Find NJ.com on Facebook.