Medical Question

[Zazu]

Take good care of SWMBO and make sure she takes good care of herself. Sounds scary. Hopefully you'll find out it was not a silent heart attack, but maybe just a case of indigestion or something.

She's been back once more to meet with her future ex-cardiologist, who now claims he never said she probably had a heart attack. Her cardiac ultrasound showed some narrowing of small vessels, but no significant blockage. Another week and she'll get an official reading on it.

Then when the doctor says he wants her to be catheterized, she'll say, "Maybe, but not by you, MF!" and walk out. Gonna be fun to watch!

I'm hoping we can meet up in May for a nice breakfast at Sanaa.

No word yet if Sanaa will be serving breakfast or not. Hope so. Be glad to join you elsewhere if not.

[CBeilby]

Bald kids with tubes hanging off of them really hit me like a punch in the gut.

I had a friend for several years who was a Pediatric Special Duty nurse. *sees DisneyMom wincing from the other side of the internet, no doubt* This is exactly why she had to finally change specialties.

[Big Wallaby]

Why can't that be malpractice? For a doctor to say he never said something he did say is downright scary. Wombat, come prosecute! Sic' em, Wombat!

Good luck, Zazu. That "c" word is never fun, but here's hoping it's all been caught in time.

[DisneyMom]

Just a tiny bit of info-
An EKG might indicate a POSSIBLE MI, but further testing is needed to confirm it. This is why you go to the hospital for further testing and labwork when you have chest pain. Some people such as diabetics, do not always feel chest pain during an MI.
People can have cardiac damage from a spasm in the cardiac arteries, yet have no blockage. This happened to my step-father, who actually was lucky enough to be revived by CPR, but was out of oxygen long enough to cause memory loss( years of drinking probably doesn't help either:rolleyes :)

I hope no further testing is required, but it is perfectly ok to get a second opinion.

[turkeyham]

One of my friends who works in Outdoor Vending a few weeks ago had a massive heart attack. She went into urgent care and they thought she was having an ansthma attack. It was not. She was sent to the following day to the hospitol and she found out that the heart attack distroyed 60% of her heart. She is out on medical leave for about 4 months. She scared me and my step mom really bad. She is only 53. :(

[DisneyMom]

One of my friends who works in Outdoor Vending a few weeks ago had a massive heart attack. She went into urgent care and they thought she was having an ansthma attack. It was not. She was sent to the following day to the hospitol and she found out that the heart attack distroyed 60% of her heart. She is out on medical leave for about 4 months. She scared me and my step mom really bad. She is only 53. :(

No affront to your friend, but all people, ESPECIALLY those who have cardiac risk factors should call 911 when they experience chest pain or severe difficulty breathing, or signs of a stroke IMMEDIATELY. Urgent cares are not meant for emergency situations, although they often do show up there anyway. It sounds like your friend was in congestive heart failure after the damaged heart could not pump blood effectively- an early sign is the accumulation of fluid in the lungs and dependent areas of the body.

Cardiac risk factors include:
Hypertension
High Cholesterol level
Obesity
Sedentary life style
Diabetes
Smoking
Strong family history

The earlier Emergency care is accessed, the greater probability for survival.Paramedics can start those life-saving treatments on the way to the hospital.

[hobie16]

New preventative med.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 02934.html

[felinefan]

The problem we women have is that our heart attack symptoms can differ from a man's. And God help you if you have some kind of anomaly, like a heart that actually points to the right instead of the left side. I read of one lady who kept having sharp pain in her right elbow. They did X-rays, etc., thinking she'd hurt her arm, or had a joint problem, but nothing showed up. Several months later, she suddenly died. An autopsy showed that the cause of death was a heart attack; the reason she had pain in her right elbow was her heart was flipped over, so it pointed to the right side of her chest instead of the left. It showed she'd had a series of small attacks, which was why she had the referred pain in her elbow. Apparently they not only missed the fact her heart was turned around, but the fact she had blockages in her arteries.


Even when we don't have a physical anomaly, we still don't get the classic symptoms like men get, such as the "elephant sitting on the chest" sensation. Ours can be more subtle, and with our generally smaller blood vessels, we are more likely to die of a heart attack than men--there's just not that much leeway.

[DisneyMom]

We had a patient whose heart was on the right side instead of the left- Our EKG machine did print out the fact- so we had to place the electrodes "backwards" to get a correct reading.
I wonder if that lady who had the reversed heart had ever had any previous medical care where they could have figured out the problem?

[felinefan]

I don't know--it was one of those blurbs they print as examples, and didn't get into her medical history prior to that. And it's been several years since I read it.