Paul's Heart

Life As A Dad, And A Survivor

Archive for the category “Side Effects”

30 Apr 2017
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How To Save A Life


Okay, forget Grey’s Anatomy.  Let me tell you how a life is really saved… mine.  Well at least one of the times.

First, how did I get to this particular moment?  To treat my Hodgkin’s Lymphoma (the original life saving event), I was treated with both chemotherapy, and radiation therapy.  It is the radiation therapy that  caused life saving event number two.  Unlike what patients today would be exposed to, I had been exposed to 4000 grays of ionized radiation.  To put that in perspective, that is more than 4 times the lifetime maximum exposure limit.  Mention this to any radiation tech or nuclear power plant worker today and they would cringe.  The fact is, it did save my life.  Unfortunately, it was unknown back in 1989, what doing that much radiation to me would lead to long term.  Even when I was going through my treatments, I barely knew any long term survivors who actually were exposed to worse levels than I was exposed to.

So, anyway, the radiation has had a cumulative effect on me, still does to this day.  But nine years ago, I was diagnosed with a “widow maker”, a blockage of the LAD (the main artery going to the heart).  Radiation had so badly scarred that artery, it was blocked nearly 90%.  So, for the rest of the story, you can go to the page on “Paul’s Heart” called “CABG – Not Just A Green Leafy Vegetable.”  The purpose of this post, is to summarize the extraordinary efforts that were used to save this life.

I was wheeled into the operating room, around 6:30am.  That is the last place that I remember until waking up in the Intensive Care Unit, alone, just my nurse trying to keep me calm.  I had just had a procedure the day before, and though I knew I was going to have a bypass, I was in no way prepared for what condition I was going to be in.  Seeing that I was extremely emotional upon waking up, and going into a full blown panic attack not seeing anyone familiar, I was re-sedated.

Fast forward, as I am known to do, I obtained the records of this experience.  I had to.  The doctor had no one to explain what was done, so that it could be explained to me.  The operative report is three pages long, but clearly, does adequately the skills that were used to save my life.

Once in the operating room, the only thing I had been wearing, the gown, had been removed.  I was covered only by a blanket.  At that point, everything was connected to me, tubes connected or inserted, all to prepare for the surgery.  Prophylactic antibiotics were administered, not just because this was a risky procedure, but because I had not spleen, which puts me at a higher risk for infections.

Then they opened me up.  Because they could not harvest a sufficient vein from my leg, they actually used my mammary artery.  Once they were done prepping this graft, I was put on a bypass machine.  For the first time in 42 years, I was no longer going to be breathing on my own, nor having my own heartbeat.  A machine was going to be doing that for me.  And here is where it got surreal for me reading this report.  “The patient was placed on bypass, cooled, and emptied.”  Emptied?  Yes, my heart was emptied blood, and in its place would be an antegrade solution.  This was all done to keep my body cold, keep my heart safe, so that when I was put back together, the heart would be back to its preoperative condition.

There is a whole bunch of stuff that was done, and when it was, my heart “was allowed to fill with blood”, and after 45 minutes on the heart/lung machine, my heart was jumpstarted.

Of course, there were other things that had to be completed before finally closing me up.  And there was a lot to be done.  But the surgery had been successful.

Why do I bring this story up?  Because I am someone who can appreciate just how expensive medicine can be.  I am extra critical of the insurance industry and their greed.  I am definitely opposed to the efforts of our current government to deal with health care.  If the government had enacted the American Health Care Act, and I had to have this done, I would be dead.  I already have the pre-existing condition of cancer which would put me in the high risk pool, a pool that I would never be able to afford for the care that I need.

And without insurance, I do not have the faith in medicine to put any kind of effort to save my life, knowing that they will never get paid for their work because I would have no insurance.

You want to save a life?  Many lives?  Our government needs to go back to the drawing board.  Perhaps it is time to go with the single payer health insurance.  But the current direction that our government is going to result in people dying.  I have many more pre-existing conditions all created by my original cancer diagnosis.  I would hate to think that my 27 years of survivorship will have been for nothing, having been put at risk for the benefit of politics, lobbying, and corporate greed.

Posted in Cancer, Education, Inspired By..., Side Effects, The Heart
27 Apr 2017

Behind The Mask


I am going to share some information with you.  During the recent and large brush fires that we experienced here in southwest Florida, I heard several people speak about wearing “masks” to help deal with the smoke.  Of course, the masks that people refer to are nothing more than those used by doctors, surgical masks.

And we have seen these masks used in several different settings by common people in every day situations.  The masks are worn to prevent inhaling allergens or dust, perhaps with the belief that it will protect the person from inhaling a contagion such as the flu or cold.  People can be seen walking the streets, on airplanes, even in doctor waiting rooms, wearing these masks.

You are not as protected wearing these types of masks as you think you are.  In fact, if anything, to a certain degree you protect other people from you.

If you are going to wear a mask, you want to make sure it will serve the purpose you are wearing it.  But honestly, a plain surgical mask is nothing more than a sneeze/cough catcher, and possibly preventing a direct hit of the wearer’s bad breath.  The material is too thin, and it also does not “seal”, and that is the important word, seal around your mouth and nose.  The only way to prevent inhaling smoke, dust, allergens, or contagions, is wearing something called a respirator.

Respirators come in various styles.  What I have pictured is a common respirator.  I know this because at one time in my life, I worked in an environment that required “respirator training.”  In other words, learning and making sure you use the respirator properly.  A respirator when properly worn, will seal and prevent any outside hazards from being inhaled.  The mask has material built inside, to crimp around the contour of your jaw and nose, making a seal.  If you are wearing it properly, as you breath, you will feel the respirator almost “suck” to your face.  That means that there is a seal.  And if it does not, then you are basically wearing it as if it were a surgical mask, offering little if no protection at all.

Of course, in a professional setting, the training involved a lot more than just putting it on and seeing if it stuck to your face.  I actually wore a hood over top of my head, while wearing the respirator, while a mild scent was sprayed inside the hood.  If I could smell the material, then I did not have a seal.

When you are trying to prevent something from entering your lungs, you need to wear the correct mask, and a surgical mask is not it.  A surgical mask will not protect you from smoke inhalation, grass allergies, dust storms, or someone with a case of the flu.  The rule is quite simple, and you do not to be a professional, if you can smell it, you definitely are not protected from it.

 

Posted in Cancer, Education, Family and Friends, Inspired By..., Side Effects, The Heart | Leave a comment
24 Apr 2017

You Can’t Take It With You


If there is one thing that being a cancer survivor has taught me, is that life will carry on with or without you, and all the possessions you have mean nothing, if life carries on without you.  In a matter of minutes, you can go from thinking no one can get along without you.  And if you are lucky enough, that you get a second chance,  what hurts almost as much, is to see that as you recover, you may not be as valuable as you thought you were.

I get it.  Because it happened to me.  I was told I needed emergency heart surgery.  Just like that, all the money I had made, all the things that I had purchased, no longer mattered.  All I could think about were my two young daughters and the possibility that they could end up without their father.

My car, my house, vacations, all things material… nothing mattered to me at that moment, than getting through the surgery for my daughters.

Over the last week, in Southwest Florida, weather conditions have left the area prime for brush fires.  With windy conditions, drought conditions, and plenty of dead vegetation, it took no time at all for the fire to spread to 7500 acres.  But as fire fighters tried to contain the fire, winds pushed the fire towards urbanized areas.  Mandatory evacuations were issued.  And just as with any other natural disaster, there are always people who will defy those types of orders.  We have all seen people interviewed on television in situations such as being in the path of a brush fire, or hurricane, who insist on staying put in their homes.

It is sad and frustrating to watch.  Homeowners basically sacrifice their lives to protect their property.  They are willing leave their family and to die for their belongings.  Worse, as first responders are known to do, emergency personnel often find themselves having to rescue these people, putting their own lives at risk.  As one emergency personnel member put it during the recent brush fire, “if you choose to remain in your home, not only may we not be able to save you, but we will not be able to do flyovers dumping water and flame retardant over your home, for fear of injuring you with the impact of the liquid.  And yes, you can get hurt by the impact of the water down below.

Thinking about it, I never hear one person say what they will do to protect their home from the fire, or flooding.  They just say, that they are going to do all that they can.  They do not say “why” they are doing it, only that “it’s all they have.”  Could a homeowner actually prevent their home from burning to the ground with a garden hose?  Can a homeowner actually keep floodwaters from flushing out the contents of their home?  Of course not by themselves.  And they have to know that.  Though they do not state it, could they be afraid of looters?  In an evacuation area, police and sometimes national guard members are deployed to the evacuated areas to prevent looting.  Do they realize that they are putting others at risk to potentially need to save them or prevent other damage?

It is sad to say, that often through tragedy or crisis, we realize what is important, what we can really do without.  How many have attics packed with knickknacks that have not been seen in decades, but during an emergency, they become a priority more so than our lives?  It makes no sense really.  Having been there, in that life or death situation, I know my priority.

I went into a cardiologist office for a simple treadmill test (or so I thought).  I was told it needed to be corrected as soon as possible, like “tomorrow.”  And once on the table, it was discovered that it was far worse than imagined, and I would need open heart surgery.  I had explained to my daughters, that I was just going in to the doctor to have something simple done, that I would see them the next day.  I went through the next 36 hours without seeing them or holding them while I waited for my surgery.  Because of my late effect damage from radiation and chemotherapy treatments for Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, the surgery was going to be quite risky.  I might not make it through the surgery, and all I could think about was holding my daughters one final time, and not getting the chance.

Yeah, if I am told to evacuate because of fire or hurricane, you can bet your ass, I am out of there.  There is absolutely nothing more important than those in my life.  Everything else can be replaced.

Posted in Cancer, Inspired By..., Side Effects, The Heart | Leave a comment

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