Bernie Kosar speaks with 3News' Jay Crawford one week after liver transplant

Just one week after having liver transplant surgery, Cleveland Browns legend Bernie Kosar spoke to reporters prior to being discharged from University Hospitals.

Kosar spoke alongside his surgeon, Dr. Zoe Stewart, and the president of UH Cleveland Medical Center, Stathis Antoniades, during Monday's press conference.

"In no way did I think I'd be sitting here on Thanksgiving week, 'Victory Monday' for the Browns on a victory road win, but even more so, what a real victory it is for me to be able to come out on Thanksgiving week," Kosar told reporters. "I've never really been into my birthdays, but you know, my birthday tomorrow (Nov. 25), I didn't really think I was going to be alive for my 62nd birthday."

Kosar, who announced last year that he was dealing with both liver failure and Parkinson's disease, had been admitted twice to UH for potential transplants before finally getting what Stewart called "a good organ offer" during the weekend of Nov. 15-16, leading up to his transplant surgery on Nov. 17.

"Like many patients, the road to transplant was filled with a lot of bumps and some false starts along the way that were really very much an emotional roller coaster for any patient," Stewart explained.


"Bluntly, three months ago — 10 weeks ago, when that stuff really amplified into a rapid deterioration of my body — the absolutely realistic side, the business side of me (felt), 'There's no way, there's no way I'm going to be alive,'" Kosar admitted.

In the days leading up to the surgery, Kosar was, in Stewart's words, "incredibly, incredibly sick" and dealt with "life-threatening bleeding complications" that required "five or six interventions."

"He's been needing almost weekly what we call paracentesis, which is having fluid removed off of the abdomen," she added. "He was having 910 liters a week removed, and it's incredible. It takes an incredible toll on the patient and it also makes them severely malnourished."

Stewart said the transplant itself took five hours and Kosar responded well.

"He (Kosar) was one of our few patients who was able to have his breathing tube removed in the operating room at the conclusion," she said. "I think most of you saw he's had a very smooth recovery since then."

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