Signs Force Him to Listen to His Heart

It was Sunday, Nov. 2, 1997, around 4:30 p.m.

Santa Barbara was experiencing another heat wave. I had just returned home from the beach with our daughter, Jeannie. My husband, Bill, and son, Jimmy, had spent the day doing guy stuff and were getting ready for dinner. Bill said that he wasn’t feeling well and went to lie down. I thought that was rather odd since we were expecting friends to join us that evening.

I went back to the bedroom to take a shower and check on Bill. I found him on all fours in front of the fan. He said he was “flashing.”

I reached over to touch his forehead. It was wet and cold. I told him I was going to call the doctor, and he said, “No, I’m feeling better.”

Then he threw up in the sink and said again that he felt better.

“Right!”

He said he didn’t want me to call the doctor because he hadn’t signed his new life insurance policy! He was going to do it when he got to the office in the morning.

“It’s not going to do me much good if you drop dead tonight!” I said.

When he told me his chest felt tight, I said, “That’s it. I’m calling 911.” As soon as I hung up the phone, I heard the sirens sound at our neighborhood fire station.

What Bill did not tell me was that he had been having symptoms for a good week: tightness in the chest, shortness of breath and tingling in his hands. On Saturday, he left the tennis court early, complaining of nausea. Of course, it was 100-plus degrees that day and I had attributed his nausea to the heat.

Then, while playing golf the next morning, he experienced tightness and shortness of breath. In complete denial, he blamed it on the hot weather. When the symptoms went away, he kept on going--even surfing that afternoon. When I came home at 4:30 and the symptoms returned, he could no longer hide them.

In a way, I was prepared for something like this. Knowing that his father had died at age 46 of a massive heart attack made me ever watchful for the symptoms.

When the paramedics arrived, they gave Bill nitroglycerin and took us to St. Francis Hospital. There, cardiologist Dr. Alan Brown performed an angiogram. It indicated a 99.9% blockage in Bill’s left main artery. Dr. Brown recommended angioplasty or bypass surgery. An angioplasty would probably be successful, but the blockage could return within a year.

Open heart surgery, on the other hand, offered long-term results and, given Bill’s family history, it might be a better choice. Bill turned 53 only last May. While we were discussing the pros and cons of both surgeries, Bill began complaining of tightness in his chest again. We looked at each other and agreed right then on bypass surgery.

Since St. Francis didn’t provide bypass surgery backup, Bill was once again transported by ambulance to Cottage Hospital, which, fortunately, was nearby.

We met Dr. Richard Westerman, the heart surgeon, in the intensive care unit. We liked him immediately and felt Bill was in the best of hands. He told us that there was only a 1% chance of failure. We could live with those odds. Dr. Brown also mentioned that his own father flew in to Dr. Westerman when he needed bypass surgery.

After Bill was shaved and prepped, he was ready to be transported to the operating room. It was now about 8 o’clock. As the attendants wheeled him past me, I gave him the thumbs-up sign and a big smile. What I really wanted to do was cry. But, for now, I didn’t have the time. They told me the surgery would last about 2 1/2 hours. I went out to the waiting room to make dreaded phone calls to Bill’s family and mine. There I found our good friends, Julie Teufel and Charlie Cappel. Julie came to be with me at St. Francis and followed us over to Cottage.

Julie was quite taken by Dr. Brown. He was tall, dark and handsome. If you didn’t have a heart condition, he could give you one! I teased Julie that I was going to call her husband and tell him that Bill was OK but that she had developed a heart problem! It was one of the lighter moments of the evening.

Two hours later, I met Dr. Westerman in the waiting room and was informed the surgery was successful. I saw Bill once more before I went home for the night. He was still completely out of it and had tubes attached all over.

Early the next morning, I returned to the hospital and again met with Dr. Westerman. He said Bill would now be able to see his great-grandchildren someday! We also learned Bill’s blockage is commonly referred to as the “widow maker’s lesion” because a heart attack stemming from a blockage in the left main artery is usually fatal.

By 2 p.m. Monday, Bill was able to take his first walk, and by 5 p.m., he was out of ICU. He remained hospitalized for two more nights and was sent home Wednesday morning.

Bill now has a new artery from his mammary and is feeling better. Recovery from open heart surgery is slow, but he improves daily. When he first returned home, he was like a little old man. He walked hunched over, took short, quick breaths of air, and a five-minute walk really tired him out.

Now he’s walking 30 minutes a day and recently began cardiac rehab with Bob Huhn at the Human Performance Center. He’s also been attending lectures at Cottage Hospital on lifestyle and dietary changes to maintain a healthy heart.

In the future, he will be monitored closely. Unfortunately, as our internist, Dr. William Morton-Smith said, “it took an event” to get Bill to pay attention to his heart.

Last year, he had skipped a treadmill test. Since he had low cholesterol and was in pretty good shape, he figured he needn’t bother. But his genetic history, combined with a type A personality and high-stress job, made for a lethal combination.

I just hope gene therapy will be performed by the time our children reach middle age.

For now, we are enjoying our good fortune and faith in the successful surgery and continuing care and treatment of Bill’s heart condition. We have a new appreciation for healthy foods and exercise, and plan on making them part of our everyday lives.