Joe, and all.
Thanks for the prayers and positive thoughts. Brian is doing EXTREMELY well. As a matter of fact, I just brought him home from the hospital. That hardly seems possible given that the heart attack was Monday afternoon and that there was 100% blockage of an artery. But two stents later, he seems to be fine. Very tired, but fine. We're all amazed with the technology as well as the professionalism of the cardiac team that met him in the ER. Within minutes of getting there he was hooked up to monitors, they'd confirmed that he was having a heart attack and he was sent to the Cath unit. The number of staff doubled and tripled within seconds, with every person taking their role in the process. After the procedure, we were actually able to observe him in the unit while viewing monitors with real time video of his heart...his cardiologist pointing out the area that had been blocked and where the stents were placed. So INCREDIBLE to watch his heart beating and follow the arteries and veins throughout the heart.
I am extremely grateful that we recognized symptoms as possibly being those of a heart attack and that we quickly got to the ER. That's the lesson here, I guess. Learn to recognize the symptoms and get to the ER or call 911 quickly. http://www.americanheart.org/presenter.jhtml?identifier=3053 In retrospect, we probably should have called 911 and not driven, but thankfully Pittsburg is a small city and it was a few minutes to the med center. They tell us that Brian's being there within the "the golden hour" made all of the difference. Note that I'm NOT saying to wait an hour. Every second counts. In the time that Brian went from productively working at his desk and feeling fine, to having a headache, pain in both arms, nausea, chest pain and breaking out in a cold sweat, only 10 minutes or less had elapsed. He called me (instead of an ambulance) and I calmly insisted (as I drove) that it wasn't the flu. I think he needed to hear me say it as well. Still didn't prepare either one of us for hearing the doctor say "Mr. Jones, you are having a heart attack." Even though he's never smoked. Even though not overweight. Even though he has a past history as an athlete. Even though his family has no history of heart problems. Even though he'd felt fine only minutes earlier.
BTW there's no correlation between the incident and our sitting (and standing) through that thrilling PSU Women's triple OT victory Saturday night! That 3OT has been REPEATEDLY suggested to us as the cause.  Nope. That brought JOY to Daddy's heart watching our Aubrey play. And the Tall Guy just came in here to tell me that the game's being replayed on television RIGHT NOW and he's going to watch it again.
Peace.
Pat
Last edited on Thu Feb 26th, 2009 01:44 am by ks
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