An arteriovenous malformation rupture left a Miami man unable to function.

By: Krysten Brenlla

Rodrick Harden, 55, spent many years serving Miami-Dade County as a roll-off truck driver, keeping our community beautiful.

On January 4, 2021, Harden was on his way to the landfill for his last dump of the day. When he opened the back door of the truck, a powerful gust of wind struck him, and he fell on debris, hitting his head. Harden felt some discomfort after the fall, but decided to head home for the day and get some rest.

He never would have thought that the fall would almost take his life.

“When I was driving home, I noticed my vision was funny, and I felt a weird sensation in my head. I thought, ‘You just fell, of course you’re going to feel discomfort,’” Harden said. “When I got home, my wife told me to go take a shower. In the shower, it started to become much more apparent that I was not able to move and function normally.”

Harden soon heard an alarming pop noise in his head.

“It sounded like you were twisting a cap off of a soda beverage,” he said. “My head got extremely hot. I grabbed my clothes, went to the bedroom, and called my wife. I knew I needed to call the rescue right away.”
When Harden’s wife, Renee, arrived to the bedroom, his vision was shrinking, his hearing was fading, and his lower body was growing numb. When he tried to speak, his tongue felt heavy.

“Renee asked if I was having an anxiety attack, but I knew this was different,” Harden said. “I remember telling her that the rescue needed to hurry because I thought I was going to die right in front of her.”

Within minutes, emergency medical services arrived and rushed Harden to Jackson North Medical Center.

Upon arrival, the Jackson North team discovered Harden was suffering from a rare medical condition – a brain arteriovenous malformation (AVM), or an abnormal tangle of blood vessels in the brain.

Harden’s AVM ruptured, causing a hemorrhage, or a brain bleed.

The emergency team worked quickly to stabilize him and get his brain bleed under control. However, to remove the AVM and stop the hemorrhaging, Harden needed surgery.

He was transferred to Jackson Memorial Hospital, where he met Jacques Morcos, MD, FRCS, FAANS, former division chief of cranial neurosurgery at Jackson Memorial, and a former UHealth – University of Miami Health System cerebrovascular and skull base neurosurgeon.

“When I was transferred to Jackson Memorial, Dr. Morcos told me that if I didn’t get it attended to, I’d die in a couple of weeks,” Harden said. “I asked him, ‘Am I going to bounce back?’ And he told me, ‘You will bounce back, but you won’t be the same as you were.’ That’s when I knew how serious it was.”

One week later, on January 13, 2021, Dr. Morcos and his team performed a successful eight-hour craniotomy procedure to remove Harden’s AVM.

After surgery, he spent one month in the hospital recovering. During his stay, he was transferred to Christine E. Lyn Rehabilitation Center for The Miami Project to Cure Paralysis at UHealth/Jackson Memorial.

“I had occupational and physical therapy for three weeks straight, and my main goals were to function without being a burden to my family,” he said.

When Harden was discharged, he was in a wheelchair. He began outpatient rehabilitation therapy at Lynn Rehabilitation Center to work on his balance, mobility, comprehension, and speech.

“My first order of business was to get out of that wheelchair, which took me about three months with physical and occupational therapy,” Harden said.

In addition to relearning how to walk and improving his balance, Harden needed intense speech therapy.
“Rodrick’s speech was very slurred, and he was suffering from imprecise articulation and short-term memory loss,” said Jenny Flaifel, a speech-language pathologist at Lynn Rehabilitation Center. “Speech was his biggest obstacle, but he was very determined, and his family support was amazing.”

After 18 months, Harden started to feel like himself again. With hard work and determination, he slowly improved.

“My tongue doesn’t move, to this day,” Harden said. “I had to learn how to use my jaw, and how to move my head so my tongue can move around to prevent me from biting it. But the people at Lynn Rehabilitation Center believe in helping us – they don’t give up on the patient, even when the patient wants to give up on themselves.”

It’s been more than three years since he suffered his life-altering AVM rupture. Despite challenges with mobility, comprehension, and speech, Harden has made a remarkable recovery. He has conversations, walks without the need of an assistive device, showers on his own, and participates in different recreational activities, like adaptive golfing, through Lynn Rehabilitation Center’s recreational therapy program.

For the future, Harden is looking forward to spending more time with his wife and family. He’s using his social media platforms to educate more people about AVMs, and continues to work with his rehabilitation team to learn new adaptive techniques to live a better quality of life.

He’s forever grateful to the teams at Jackson and Lynn Rehabilitation Center for never giving up on him.
“They are the unsung heroes,” Harden said. “They don’t just tend to patients, they teach us a new way of living, and that you still have some meaning on this earth. I thank my wife, family, doctors, and therapists for their commitment to me.”