Out of the ER room we went quickly, but not rushing. We exited the ER into a corridor and went straight to the Cath Lab where a team was waiting for me to arrive. The room was prepped and ready for whatever needed to be done. I was rolled in and carefully moved onto the table and where I was carefully positioned for the next steps. The table was surrounded on three sides with a variety of equipment I am not familiar with and a very large monitor, probably 65” or larger, standing next to the table and elevated to a height that was set for the cardiologist to have no issues seeing clearly. It was a big screen that I could see on the left side of my body. A female nurse came over to me and immediately apologized for what she was about to do, but it has to be done for a potential secondary incision for an alternate access location. She shaved one half of my groin area and I felt a bit embarrassed since in that cold environment shrinkage had overcome me. This was very much an embarrassing moment for me. I don’t want to use words like “little” or “small”, but at this very moment I kind of wished I was back in my youth and in my imagination was partying somewhere in Rio dancing in the streets in full costume and glory.
While this was going on down in the neither region, the cardiologist was preparing my right arm for another incision. I was told that this would be the primary incision based on the blockage identified. He said he would be numbing this area with a local anesthetic. So much activity was going on around me, but I was completely awake and cognizant of everyone’s movement since I was observing and absorbing what was being said. There was a room off of this main room with a dark glass window which seemed to be an observation room with what looked like other monitoring equipment. There was a person is this room doing something. The doctor then announced that he was going in and I felt this strange feeling of something moving up my arm quickly and then suddenly it was in my chest. I looked at the monitor and saw my heart pumping. WOW! I didn’t know how to react. So, when I am stressed I tend to become a bit comical so that I can relax. I made a joke to the doctor and he responded with “Please shut up, I am trying to save your life” … Well, that provided a bit of shock to me and firmly established the seriousness everyone working on me felt. I then remember looking back at the monitor and observed what appeared to be a dye being injected into the artery where the previous strange feeling of a foreign object in my body was coming from and the artery became very visible. The conversation moved to an announcement of “100% Blockage”; at least that is what I thought I heard. There was quick movement by the doctor who was manipulating the instrument in my chest, and what seemed to me to be many minutes of effort was only a few seconds, announced “Open” and then began to call out stint sizes that he was looking for. From that room I mentioned earlier came clarification communications and then suddenly I felt movement again in my arm and then watched the big monitor as this foreign object was placed. The doctor announced that everything looks good. I also heard someone say “His room is ready” and they began to prepare me for the move to my room. My ability to account for time was gone at this point and I had no idea how much time had elapsed since arriving at the Cath Lab.
Time is critical in the saving of a life. Everything that I experienced since arriving to the hospital occurred in less than 90 minutes which is the hospital’s goal. I was told anything beyond 90 minutes and your chances for survival begin to diminish exponentially. I don’t know how this is calculated, but I believe it. So, I arrived to the hospital at 11:14 AM via Fairfax EMS #403, Fairfax City 3. I was sent to the Cath Lab at 11:25 AM. I was in my room around 12:20 PM. Total time from arrival to recovery in my room was 66 minutes. I am pretty sure that the blockage was opened and the stint was in place well before an hour had elapsed; that Golden Hour. Time becomes a blur when you are mentally overloaded, and when so much is happening around you. So that I could present some accuracy, I did look up my medical records for this day to account for the times noted.
I really need to pee now…
“Please feel free to share your thoughts”