A miracle of the heart - Patient Report - Letter to the Editor

Townsend Letter for Doctors and Patients,  Feb-March, 2004  by J. S. Kilanoski, Jr.

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Editor:

In the wee hours of the morning of November 7, 2001, my wife and I were awakened by a strange, eerie, unearthly melody. You can imagine my shock and amazement when I discovered that this shrill unearthly tune was emanating from me.

The day before Carol and I had celebrated our 36th wedding anniversary by going out to dinner and to a show. We returned home late and went straight to bed. About 2:30 a.m. I was awakened by a loud whistling sound. It was loud enough to awaken Carol as well. I suffered from asthma and hay-fever as a child, but I hadn't had an asthma attack in over 40 years. We arose, and searched the house for one of our son's old allergy inhalers, but we couldn't find one. My wife is extremely allergic to peanuts, so we keep Benadryl on hand. Carol went down to the kitchen to get a couple of capsules for me. I took two. I wasn't having any trouble breathing, which is unusual for an asthma attack, nor was I having any pain. I was simply wheezing loudly, so loudly in fact, Carol said that she could even hear me all the way downstairs in the kitchen.

After about 20 minutes, the wheezing slowly evolved into a loud gurgling sound. It sounded as though I had swallowed a percolator. It reminded me of the old "Maxwell House" coffee commercials. I still had no pain or any difficulty breathing. After about 30 minutes of listening to the "happy coffee pot," Carol suggested we drive to St. Mary's Emergency Room so I could get a shot to relieve the asthma symptoms, and then, maybe, we could both go back to sleep? We got dressed and headed for the hospital.

St. Mary's Hospital is not more than a mile from our house, but about half way there my breathing became quite labored. Panic and fear gripped me to the core. I broke out in a cold clammy sweat. I asked Carol to hurry, because I couldn't breathe, Carol drove up to the Emergency Room and stopped the car. The difficulty I had breathing was now starting to subside, and I thought the Benadryl was starting to take effect. I told Carol I thought I was going to be all right, and we could go back home. Carol suggested, that as long as we were there, she thought we should go in to make sure everything was OK.

As I approached the admitting desk, the lady behind the counter, asked me what was wrong? She said she could hear the gurgling in my chest as I walked through the door. I replied, "I thought I was having an asthma attack." A man in "scrubs" and two other women rushed around the end of the counter towards me. The man said "You're not having an asthma attack. You're having congestive heart failure!"

They got me into a wheelchair and rolled me into one of the examining rooms. They peeled off my clothes, gave me a couple of injections, and hooked me up to oxygen. They shaved my chest, and attached leads for an EKG.

I told them what had happened at home. They said I was extremely fortunate that Carol brought me to the hospital when she did. They said that, if I had waited another 10 or 15 minutes, I probably wouldn't have survived.

They drew some blood, for a blood work-up, and gave me a few additional injections. After a short time I was feeling fine. The gurgling was gone, I could breathe all right, and I felt normal. I got up and asked for my clothes. I thought I would go home. The doctor snorted, "wrong!" He said that he thought I should stay the night. The doctor said that the EKG showed no heart damage, but the blood tests confirmed I had had a heart attack. The doctor insisted additional tests were necessary to determine my exact condition, and to insure that no lasting damage had been done to my heart. The doctor said that they would do an Echocardiogram around 9:00 AM, followed by a stress test later in the afternoon. He said that the results of my blood tests indicated I had had some heart problems, but he repeated that the EKG showed no heart damage. He felt the additional tests were necessary to corroborate the EKG and insure that there was no permanent heart damage.

They checked me into a room, hooked me up to oxygen, gave me several pills, and I went to sleep. Later that morning, they took me down to Cardiology in a wheelchair to get an Echocardiogram. The girl who did the scan was warm and friendly, and we were joking and kidding with each other from the time I arrived. I got out of the wheelchair, and climbed onto the examining table. We were still joking as she was preparing me for the procedure. Shortly after she started the scan, a surprised and frightened look came over her face, and her total demeanor changed. She became very serious, and seemed to be very concerned about my well-being. When she finished the procedure, I started to get up from the table and return to the wheelchair, but she didn't want me to move. She called three other technicians into the room. They lifted me from the examining table, and transferred me to a gurney instead of the wheelchair. These were four strong girls! I didn't say anything at the time, but that made me keenly aware of the severity of my circumstances.