Sarah Kimmel expected to spend three to six months in Utah while her daughter Quinn underwent treatment for a serious congenital heart condition. Instead, Kimmel has now spent 482 days at Intermountain Primary Children’s Hospital in Salt Lake City, watching her savings dwindle, her marriage end, and her housing situation grow increasingly precarious while she waits for a donor heart that has yet to arrive.
Kimmel was airlifted from Idaho to Utah in May 2025, according to a fundraiser created by her family, after Quinn’s condition required the specialized pediatric cardiac care available at Primary Children’s. As reported by FOX 13 News Utah, Quinn has spent seven of those months in intensive care and now relies on a Berlin Heart ventricular assist device, a mechanical pump that circulates her blood outside her body while she waits for a transplant. Kimmel said Quinn cannot go home while using the device because it remains part of an FDA trial.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration granted full Premarket Approval for the Berlin Heart EXCOR Pediatric Ventricular Assist Device back in June 2017 as a bridge to transplant for children, replacing an earlier temporary approval issued in 2011. That regulatory status is part of why children supported by the device must remain under close inpatient or near-hospital supervision rather than returning home to wait.
A Marriage Strained, A Job Left Behind
The prolonged separation from home has taken a toll well beyond the hospital walls. Kimmel and her husband separated after 10 years together, and Kimmel stopped working and has been unable to return to her job while Quinn remains hospitalized, per the station’s report. She now pays market rent while unable to earn income, after moving into an apartment near the hospital once her time in temporary lodging ran out…