Michael has been experiencing a few glitches the past couple of weeks. The last one put him back in the hospital.
On Tuesday morning, when I went in to give him his meds and do pump readings, Michael said his heart was racing and he didn't feel like getting up. After I finished, I turned the light off and just let him try to rest. My sister called him and wanted to take him to look at her new house and he was going to give it an honest
effort and try to go. When he came out of the bathroom, he looked
deathly. I slapped the cuff on him to see if we could get a reading.
His pressures were low, but his heart rate was HIGH. We notified the
LVAD coordinator and she said our readings were probably inaccurate and
for him to drink some water, which he did. Since he goes to clinic on
Wednesdays, he knew he would be going the next day and didn't want to make an extra trip.
The heart rate continued to be high the entire time, until he went to
clinic on Wednesday morning. Mind you... HE WALKED THE ENTIRE WAY, and
it's a LONG WALK from the parking garage to the clinic and he did it
without the walker, even in the condition he was in.
When
he got to clinic, they did the usual blood work (and more blood work)
and hooked him up to their equipment for detailed readings, etc. They
tried to tell him his heart rate was 60 and he said he saw 160. They said it wasn't. He said he begged to differ with them. The doctor told him the best way for them to get an accurate reading, was to do an
EKG, so they did. At the time they did it, his rate was 156, which was
the last reading I had gotten! The doctor said his rate had probably
been higher the day before, (when I was getting 199) and that if he didn't have the pump, he would more than likely be seriously down, or dead. There was a flurry of activity, with a crowd of doctors and they sent him straight to ICU, for a cardioversion. (shock) He had been in V Tach for over 24 hours!!!
They have him scheduled for a catheter ablation on Monday, to remove some scar tissue around the pump cannula that they think is causing the problem. He is also testing positive for HITT (heparin antibodies), again, but they said they will work around it. While doing the ablation, they will decide if he will need to have a defibrillator implanted. If so, he will probably have that done on Tuesday.
