Monthly Archive: October 2023
Atrial Fibrillation. Many people have heard about Atrial Fibrillation. Even so, I hope you continue to read about this relatively common heart disease, which can be unpleasant. Moreover, if not treated, it can be life-threatening in some circumstances. Causes are too many to mention (a thousand), but the big ones are: Congenital heart diseases and athletes with predisposition to heart disease. Wow, Athletes! I had a patient in his 20s who had something called Wolff Parkinson White syndrome which is a serious congenital defect with atrial fibrillation. I was glad he told his doctor how he was feeling and we did identify an abnormality on his ECG for something referred to as a delta wave. Something subtle that can be easily missed. If you remember, my father had heart disease, most likely due to smoking and being overweight. He had a heart attack, mitral valve disease, and congestive heart failure...
One of the worst days of my life was receiving a call from the ER physician telling me that my youngest sister has metastatic lung cancer. She went to the ER after she had developed a severe cough that would not resolve and had been recently diagnosed with Covid-19. The ER doctor had been worried about a possible blood clot in her lungs as her lab showed elevated D-dimer which is a blood test that detects a protein your body makes to break down blood clots. Her number was extremely high. He mentioned seeing something concerning in her abdomen; however, due to the CT being done primarily for the lungs they could not exactly tell what it was but advised getting an abdominal CT as soon as possible. Now the scrambling began. Her primary care doctor had left the practice, so she did not have anyone immediately available to order...
I should start with a definition by the American Heart Association (AHA): “Heart failure can progress, so researchers have identified four stages of the disease — A, B, C and D. Health care professionals also classify heart failure when it has progressed to stages C and D. This classification measures a patient’s overall heart function and severity of symptoms”. There are further definitions based on classes ( I- IV). I encourage people to go to the AHA website to get more information, I have added the website to my resource page. I need to add that there is not just one kind of heart failure: As I mentioned in the previous post my father had a degree of heart failure after his heart attack. A portion of his heart was not contracting well from the damage to the muscle on the bottom left side of his heart and possibly some...
Surviving Disease. Sounds simple to some and impossible to others; however, one of the best keys to surviving any disease begins with education. I have been a registered nurse for 30+ years and continue to learn and evolve as an educator, patient advocate and health care provider. Please go to my “About Me” to read about my work experiences. My goal with this blog is to provide an educational resource to help people better understand their disease process and use my personal experiences to help guide them through the medical maze. I have found with some of my patients or my family, a simple lack of understanding of why they got sick and what they can do along with their physician to get well. The internet, which is a fabulous tool, can be daunting due to the highly technical language and some recommendations may not be appropriate for your particular...
