A Word Of Caution For All

First of all I am not a doctor, but I do have a couple of degrees in science and have ensured I know what I am talking about...as this could have killed me

I am heading to the hospital today to have a hole in my heart closed. In early May of this year (2017), I had a minor stroke while driving down the road with my 13 year old boy. I am a fairly healthy 59 year old male, who has been active all my life, lived over seas 25 years of my life, played sports in high school, rock and ice climbed in my 20s and spent much of my adult life training military and police in a number of very physical activities.

It turns out this hole in my heart has been there all my life. When you are born your heart has a large hole that allows fluid to pass through your body to get oxygen to your blood from your mother blood. When you start breathing at birth, this hole is suppose to close. In 20% of the population this hole does not close in one form or another. Most are the size of a needle. In my case the hole is 1 cm (about .37 inches)...The stroke I had was caused when a blood clout went through the hole, rather than going to the lungs to be filtered, and went to my brain.

You may be asking, why wouldn't this have been detected from normal tests. I have had CT scans, MRIs, X-Rays and every other type of testing and no one knew what caused this or that I had this anomaly. It turns out the only way to detent this is to inject saline with bubbles into your blood system and have an ultrasound of your heart at the same time. During this test you can see the bubbles move from one side of my heart to the other and not go through the lungs.

As you get older, past 45 years old, if you have a stroke and the doctors can't find a logical reason for this stroke...make sure you mention a PFO (patent foramen ovale). Lucky for me there were no last effects from the stroke (a total of 30 minutes) and I had an attentive 13 year old who insisted that I go to the hospital...

05/30/2018 - Update
Its been a little under 1 year...I have had a couple of tests done on me...The tests show I have complete oxygenation of my blood now, no bypass of blood going around my lungs and I am like a hamster on a wheel all the time...I'm never tired either...

 

good advise and glad you're still with us!

 

Thanks guys...I will have the procedure this afternoon and will be out tomorrow...

 

Update?

 

So, I had the operation...it turns out over the last few years, the latest method for closing a PFO (see first post) was to put a tube (Catheter) into your femoral vein and put something like a two sided umbrella in your heart to close the hole. This unfortunately means you would have foreign objects inside of you for life and would require you to take a number of medications for life. My doctor, James Thompson of Pediatric Cardiology in Fairfax, VA is doing a revolutionary new (New in the US) form of surgery. I was the 6th person in the US (tens of thousands of this operation have been done in Europe and Canada) to have a similar catheter run into the vein, but instead a camera and sewing system is run inside. They closed my hole (my kid laughs every time I say I had a big hole) by sewing the hole closed, which then heals and becomes normal heart muscle tissue. I was in the operating room less than 1 hours and was up, walking and leaving the hospital within 4 hours...My only restriction was to take it easy for 3 days to ensure the hole in my leg healed properly. At this point I have no restrictions of activities (I cut wood, building a house, training my new puppy, etc.) and after 2 months I will not longer have to take any meds. After 1 week now, I wake up after 8 hours of sleep (I was sleeping 10 to 12 hours a night and did not feel rested before) and feel 100%...previously I was only getting 40% of my blood oxygenated and now I am at 100%...I have so much energy I don't know what to do some times...I am also being told this will reduce my blood pressure (bring it back into a normal range without medication) and will reduce my chances of having sleep-apnea in the future...What an incredible fix...timing is everything...for all you old guys, like me, shit happens for a reason and although I could have never seen this coming or even know about it, I'm glad I found the right doctor and got this fixed in a way that did not require me to take meds forever or restrict my life...

 

Wow, awesome news! Glad to hear things are on the mend for you both figuratively and literally. I love hearing of new pioneering procedures in medicine making people's lives better. I had a bit of a scare myself almost a year ago when I ended up with multiple massive pulmonary embolisms (blood clot in my lungs) and came pretty close to kicking the bucket myself. I hope you take this is a positive change in your life and live your life to the fullest moving forward as a result. I know I did.

Keep on keepin' on brother!

 

First your windshield bursts, then ac takes a dump, and then you have a stroke. And I get annoyed that my passenger seat vibrates.

 

I am learning not to let the bullshit bother me...Hearts, who need a heart...my wife keeps telling me I have to have one to get it fixed....

Thank you all for your well wishes and concerns...

 

Glad to know you are doing well!

Your wife has a sick sense of humor.......but you gotta give her credit that was fuuuuuny!

 

After the fact it really was something to laugh about...