In writing about my upcoming heart surgery for IndyScribe, I stumbled across some information during research that is really disturbing, and may change my mind about having open-heart surgery. According to research, being on a heart and lungs machine during the operation can cause “cognitive decline” in 42% of patients — in other words, brain
Read on »Posts Tagged: cardiovascular medicine
Cool Headstones
In the event that I die, which I’m quite certain will be 50 years from now and not any time soon, I really want to have this cool headstone from Lundgren Monuments. Because it’s glass and is really cool looking.
Read on »Tired
I started to leave for lunch to get some sunshine a little while ago. Unfortunately, although I remembered my wallet and key card, I forgot to take my car keys with me. And on my car keys is the elevator fob to get past the security block on the elevator. So to get back to
Read on »Living Wills
Stephanie and I met with an attorney last night to arrange to get living wills. She’ll draw them up and then send them to us next week. She charges $230 an hour (wow!) and it should take her a couple of hours to get it done. Ouch. But it’s better than the alternative. Here in
Read on »Frustration
I think the thing that bothers me most right now is that there are so many things I’m not supposed to do. In any given day, I do probably 40 or 50 things that are now on the list of restricted activities that aren’t allowed lest they give me congestive heart failure and leave me
Read on »Take another little piece of my heart now, baby
After he heard about my heart surgery, Brad said he thought about sending me a copy of Melissa Etheridge’s cover of Janis Joplin’s “Pieces of My Heart.” I guess he hesitated because he was worried I’m be offended. But no, I think that’s pretty funny.
Read on »April 22nd – My Surgery Date
So my surgery will be April 22nd. From what Dr. Beckman and his staff told me, it won’t be nearly as difficult a recovery as I’ve been expecting from the reading I’ve been doing. I’ll only be in the hospital about 5 days. After that I will be home, but I won’t be bedridden. I’ll
Read on »Animal Instinct
The other day when I was sitting in the Cardiologist’s waiting room, there was a video playing about health issues and medical breakthroughs. One of the stories was about a woman who had devastating epileptic seizures and who couldn’t live on her own because of them. They came without warning and rendered her helpless, so
Read on »Living Will
Wow, reading this about Terri Schiavo’s case makes it clear why it’s important for me (and everyone!!) to have a living will. As much as the idea of creating that document frightens me, the idea of something like this happening to me frightens me more. God forbid my life become a political football for the
Read on »Dr. Daniel Beckman, M. D.
Here’s some information about Dr. Beckman, who will be my heart surgeon, apparently. And here’s another bio page on him. Also, here’s some info on some rare procedure that Dr. Beckman is pioneering (not what I need done). Here’s a video [real player required] of Dr. Beckman talking about some rare procedure he’s done on
Read on »Transesophageal Echocardiogram Today
I go in for my Transesophageal Echocardiogram (TEE Test) today at 3 at Methodist Hospital downtown. I had a big breakfast because I can’t eat 5 hours before the test, since they stick a tube down my throat to do an ultrasound from inside my body. They also have to sedate me, so Stephanie’s coming
Read on »This is why my sister should have a blog
She never stops cracking me up: Why, that’s just not true. In addition to good vibes, I can send you goodies for after surgery. Of course, I can’t send anything funny, or you’ll laugh and your chest will hurt. And I can’t send you anything sad because you’ll cry and your chest will hurt. And
Read on »Stuff you read on the internet that scares the crap out of you
From this page: Expectations after surgery: The rate of success of heart valve surgery is high — and increasing. The operation provides symptom relief and prolongs life. The death rate varies depending on the heart valve and averages 2% to 5%. Approximately 2 of every 3 patients who received an artificial mitral valve are still
Read on »Open Heart Surgery
I’ve waited a bit to write about this, because I need to talk to my family and friends first. It appears that I will need to have open heart surgery to repair my defective heart valves. I’m hoping to get some other opinions and information on less invasive types of surgery, but that appears to
Read on »Transesophageal Echocardiogram
More health-related googling and blogging for me. Transesophageal Echocardiogram TEE or Transesophageal Echo Basically, I have to have one of these soon to see what’s actually going on inside my heart. Today I went to the cardiologist (Dr. Yee, Cardiac Care Center, Methodist Hospital) to talk about the results of my recent echocardiogram. While I
Read on »Heart Update
I got a call from the nurse… my cholesterol is down from last time I had it checked. It’s 181, which is considered normal. All my other bloodwork is good, too, including my potassium and calcium levels, so the doctor is quite happy with that, and I need to keep eating healthy and not let
Read on »Echocardiogram fun
I had my test yesterday, but I don’t find out the results of it for a couple more days. It went really smoothly, though, I think. It was very interesting and I want to write more about it when I get some time. I’m hoping that I can write enough about it to make a
Read on »Heart Matters
What an echo-cardiogram is. Also, the dangers of Endocarditis, also known as heart valve infection. I’m googling these things because I have to go get an echo-cardiogram for the first time since I was a kid. I have a congenital heart murmur, which has apparently gotten worse in the last two years. More specifically, I
Read on »