16 February 2014
Stayin' Alive, Woo Woo Woo Woo, Stayin' Alive
16/02/14 17:29
As some of you have heard, this week was another trip to Victoria for medical reasons. For once though, it wasn’t me.
You see this all started a couple of weeks ago. Marsha mentioned that she was experiencing some discomfort. Mostly it was related to times of stress, like when she was shopping with Barb and I, or I was undergoing some nasty treatment. We assumed it was just stress but she thought, and I agreed, that it might be a good idea to talk to the Doctor about it. He also thought it was stress but scheduled a stress test to make sure. Just in case they wrote a prescription for a Nitroglycerin spray. It helped with the symptoms, a worrying thing, but also caused a massive headache whenever she took it. A few days later Marsha, and I, went in for the test. This was where things got serious. She reached her “peak” heart rate in just a couple of minutes. They thought it might have be a cardiac problem, and set her up for an angiogram “in the next month or so”.
Then on Friday, February 7th, just a few days after the stress test, she got a call from the clinic in Victoria. They had an opening and could take her on Tuesday the 11th. (Let me interject here that I hope they had an opening and not suddenly had an opening, as the latter would imply our benefitting from somebody else’s misfortune.) We quickly got things arranged and then on Tuesday were on the road at 6:00 am. We’d been a bit worried about road conditions. Monday had been quite icy but Tuesday we mostly ran into rain, and had no problem getting there half an hour early. This was a good thing as we could start tests and an X-ray ahead of schedule.
Then they took Marsha into the ward. I was able to accompany her while they get her ready for the procedure. After a while, and a shot for Marsha, they shooed me out of there as visitors were only allowed for 15 minutes at a time. At first the nurse said that I could come back at eleven. As she walked me to the door though she mentioned that it was very possible, if the procedures ahead of Marsha went well they’d probably get her in early, possibly as early as eleven. I didn’t want to show up just as they were doing final prep, so I decided to just stay out of the way. The procedure was supposed to take an hour and a half plus some recovery time so I decided to just bide my time and call just before two.
The next few hours I sat in the food court, no WiFi, then I checked out some other spots, no WiFi, then I left the hospital and checked out some local restaurants, no WiFi, at least none that I could pick up from outside their front door. I was just about to conclude that Victoria as a WiFi free zone, (I mean Nanaimo already took the nuclear free zone thing so it was either WiFi free or land of 10,000 slugs,) when I found a WhiteSpot with WiFi. I had lunch, a great chicken caesar wrap, and fries, checked my e-mail and some sites, and then headed back to the hospital. Once back, I killed some more time, (which I realize is a bad thing to say near a hospital,) and then just before two I called the Short Stay Cardiac ward. They said that Marsha was still in surgery. To me this meant that it was going long, which I found quite worrisome. Just before three I called again and they said she was out and back in her bed in the ward. I wandered back up and got to see her again.
She was sitting there drinking some water and orange juice and eating a chicken salad sandwich. I was shooed away again. I returned at 3:00 and shortly thereafter they brought her dinner; roasted pork loin, tea, fruit, some french fries and a gin and tonic. (not really) I realized then that Marsha was going to be OK. I also realized, partially because there was no co-pay and partly that she was going to be getting out that day, that I really like Canada’s health plan. While we were chatting, Marsha had me check her phone for messages. There was one she wanted me to forward to her boss. I did this but wrote the message in Marsha’s voice, and included a few lines about the procedure and how it was going. Marsha’s boss wrote back with “Are you doing work from your hospital bed?!?” I wanted to write back with “No, they are only tying up my right arm with the procedure and I can still type with my left,” but Marsha wouldn’t let me.
At this point I want to clarify what was done, though this may be more for the nurses reading this. She did not have a heart attack, though as you will see it was close. She also did not have a stroke, as some were worried about. To do the procedure they threaded the catheter in at her wrist and up to the arteries of the heart. She was awake and could feel what was going on through the whole procedure, which had to be weird. Once at the heart they injected the dye and looked on the scanner for blockages. She had one 95% stenosis (blockage) of the Left Anterior Descending Artery at the First Diagonal Artery. When they located the one (and only) blockage they cleared it with a balloon, this is the angioplasty part, and lastly they installed a stent, a springy metal wire mesh to keep it open. Though the main obstruction was partially blocking the diagonal artery, they did not stent it as, in the words of the surgeon, “What’s there never seems to cause problems”. She’s on Plavex for the next year and they’ll keep checking back, but she feels much better. No more weird pains, no more excessive fatigue. Most importantly, no more risk of a heart attack.
At 6:30 they let us go home. It would have been much later but I told them that, “Marsha will be in good hands. I’m not a Doctor but I’ve played one on stage” which I’m sure impressed the heck out of them. The drive home was long, dark, and rainy but we made it back by 9:30 and were in bed before ten. Marsha took the next day off from work and was back at it on Thursday. Her right arm is still sore and weak, but it’s getting better, as long as she doesn’t overdo it.
So that’s what we did this week.
Doug & Marsha.
PIX: Been a little busy this week. In its place here’s a link to some Olympic Curling that my sister sent me. It’s a much more interesting sport than I ever realized.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evNi4_2qHPY
You see this all started a couple of weeks ago. Marsha mentioned that she was experiencing some discomfort. Mostly it was related to times of stress, like when she was shopping with Barb and I, or I was undergoing some nasty treatment. We assumed it was just stress but she thought, and I agreed, that it might be a good idea to talk to the Doctor about it. He also thought it was stress but scheduled a stress test to make sure. Just in case they wrote a prescription for a Nitroglycerin spray. It helped with the symptoms, a worrying thing, but also caused a massive headache whenever she took it. A few days later Marsha, and I, went in for the test. This was where things got serious. She reached her “peak” heart rate in just a couple of minutes. They thought it might have be a cardiac problem, and set her up for an angiogram “in the next month or so”.
Then on Friday, February 7th, just a few days after the stress test, she got a call from the clinic in Victoria. They had an opening and could take her on Tuesday the 11th. (Let me interject here that I hope they had an opening and not suddenly had an opening, as the latter would imply our benefitting from somebody else’s misfortune.) We quickly got things arranged and then on Tuesday were on the road at 6:00 am. We’d been a bit worried about road conditions. Monday had been quite icy but Tuesday we mostly ran into rain, and had no problem getting there half an hour early. This was a good thing as we could start tests and an X-ray ahead of schedule.
Then they took Marsha into the ward. I was able to accompany her while they get her ready for the procedure. After a while, and a shot for Marsha, they shooed me out of there as visitors were only allowed for 15 minutes at a time. At first the nurse said that I could come back at eleven. As she walked me to the door though she mentioned that it was very possible, if the procedures ahead of Marsha went well they’d probably get her in early, possibly as early as eleven. I didn’t want to show up just as they were doing final prep, so I decided to just stay out of the way. The procedure was supposed to take an hour and a half plus some recovery time so I decided to just bide my time and call just before two.
The next few hours I sat in the food court, no WiFi, then I checked out some other spots, no WiFi, then I left the hospital and checked out some local restaurants, no WiFi, at least none that I could pick up from outside their front door. I was just about to conclude that Victoria as a WiFi free zone, (I mean Nanaimo already took the nuclear free zone thing so it was either WiFi free or land of 10,000 slugs,) when I found a WhiteSpot with WiFi. I had lunch, a great chicken caesar wrap, and fries, checked my e-mail and some sites, and then headed back to the hospital. Once back, I killed some more time, (which I realize is a bad thing to say near a hospital,) and then just before two I called the Short Stay Cardiac ward. They said that Marsha was still in surgery. To me this meant that it was going long, which I found quite worrisome. Just before three I called again and they said she was out and back in her bed in the ward. I wandered back up and got to see her again.
She was sitting there drinking some water and orange juice and eating a chicken salad sandwich. I was shooed away again. I returned at 3:00 and shortly thereafter they brought her dinner; roasted pork loin, tea, fruit, some french fries and a gin and tonic. (not really) I realized then that Marsha was going to be OK. I also realized, partially because there was no co-pay and partly that she was going to be getting out that day, that I really like Canada’s health plan. While we were chatting, Marsha had me check her phone for messages. There was one she wanted me to forward to her boss. I did this but wrote the message in Marsha’s voice, and included a few lines about the procedure and how it was going. Marsha’s boss wrote back with “Are you doing work from your hospital bed?!?” I wanted to write back with “No, they are only tying up my right arm with the procedure and I can still type with my left,” but Marsha wouldn’t let me.
At this point I want to clarify what was done, though this may be more for the nurses reading this. She did not have a heart attack, though as you will see it was close. She also did not have a stroke, as some were worried about. To do the procedure they threaded the catheter in at her wrist and up to the arteries of the heart. She was awake and could feel what was going on through the whole procedure, which had to be weird. Once at the heart they injected the dye and looked on the scanner for blockages. She had one 95% stenosis (blockage) of the Left Anterior Descending Artery at the First Diagonal Artery. When they located the one (and only) blockage they cleared it with a balloon, this is the angioplasty part, and lastly they installed a stent, a springy metal wire mesh to keep it open. Though the main obstruction was partially blocking the diagonal artery, they did not stent it as, in the words of the surgeon, “What’s there never seems to cause problems”. She’s on Plavex for the next year and they’ll keep checking back, but she feels much better. No more weird pains, no more excessive fatigue. Most importantly, no more risk of a heart attack.
At 6:30 they let us go home. It would have been much later but I told them that, “Marsha will be in good hands. I’m not a Doctor but I’ve played one on stage” which I’m sure impressed the heck out of them. The drive home was long, dark, and rainy but we made it back by 9:30 and were in bed before ten. Marsha took the next day off from work and was back at it on Thursday. Her right arm is still sore and weak, but it’s getting better, as long as she doesn’t overdo it.
So that’s what we did this week.
Doug & Marsha.
PIX: Been a little busy this week. In its place here’s a link to some Olympic Curling that my sister sent me. It’s a much more interesting sport than I ever realized.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evNi4_2qHPY