Basil Bagg
Basil Bagg
Basil Bagg
"Wonders of medicine allows for quality of life after heart trauma"
During the 80’s, when I was in my early 40’s, the feedback from the annual medical specialist my Company had arranged, was that my rapid resting pulse rate of around 90, was because I was of “racehorse quality” and did everything at top speed. Being an A1 type personality, a real driving driver in my roles as Project Director / Manager and Company Director, this all seemed “so complimentary…..”
Fortunately a young doctor who is now a respected Cardiothoracic Surgeon, detected arrhythmic issues and after follow up assessments and tests, a regime of medication followed well into the mid 1990’s.
In the mid 1990’s, around 1995 / early 1996, my wife, who is a practicing physiotherapist, detected I was “not the same”…. When you add in some chest pains / spells of indigestion, by early 1997, she had convinced my then cardiologist that “something was cooking” – following 24 hour monitoring using a holter, an angiogram followed a few days later which required an immediate angioplasty – the left descending artery was 70% blocked.
The next 11 years were ones of close monitoring by my cardiologist – full bloods twice a year, stress ECG’s, sonar scans, and nuclear studies every 2nd year, including wearing a bracelet (Medic- Alert) stating “Lev’s disease, with right branch block and 1st degree heart block – pace if faints”, with the advice that one day, I could well require a pacemaker.
And so to March / April 2008… in mid March, I had successfully undergone a stress ECG for 10/12 minutes, with no feelings of discomfort, just the normal increased heart rate, BP etc and good recovery. On 22nd April, I fell off my perch… as is reasonably common, it started around 1am in the morning with chest discomfort (indigestion, thought I…??) which grew rapidly into severe chest pains and shortage of breath. I knew I was in BIG trouble; a fast drive by my wife and son to our nearby hospital (where my Cardiologist had his main practice), was followed by an M.I. just as we arrived at the ER unit, all witnessed and watched by my family. The resulting fast action by the ER team, a call to my Cardiologist, and within 2 / 3 hours of the MI, I was bedded down in the CCU unit, stent in the LDA and pipes and tubes in/out of my body.
The first week was a blur – all I seem to remember was being very uncomfortable with all the pipes, temporary pacemaker up one femonal artery, a pump assisting the heart up the other one, plus drips, oxygen etc,, and the beginnings of me being told I may have to have further surgery to implant a ICD device. After final review by the Cardiologist, this duly occurred some 6/7 weeks after the MI (in the interim, a PET scan had confirmed that 30% of my heart muscle had been destroyed by the MI, with no evidence of glucose uptake during the test).
All in all I was off work for 11 weeks. Consultations followed with a dietician, regular bloods were taken and 6 weeks after the ICD implant, I started a cardiac rehab programme under supervision of an exercise physiologist.
So what have I had to do/how are all the medical jigsaws being put together from trained staff, to enable me to now feel I have made positive progress to being able to experience a full life once again. As I write this (late November 2008, 7 months after the M.I.), I am able to:-
• Spend 6/7 hours per day in the workplace, and carry out my usual project management consulting duties.
• Do at least 2 /3 one hour sessions in the cardiac rehab unit each week. (I know I need to increase my planned walking efforts to add even further benefits to the rehab programme).
• I had lost 11 kgs during all the hospitalization from April to June, and now under the guidance of my wife and input from the dietician, I have maintained my lower body mass - it varies by ±1-1,5kg depending on how “good” I have been (by the way, my mean weight is now 79kg, and I am 1,76m tall).
• In early July, I had to take 2/3 breaks to climb 2 flights of stairs – I now do 2 flights without a break (my measure of progress).
• I am rigorous in the use of all the prescribed medication, and check my INR every 2 weeks.
• My cardiologist has adjusted the ICD from time to time, and I am now running on my own (70%) heart with the pacemaker as back up. The defibrillator has not had to fire… thank the Lord for that.
• My resting pulse is about 72, BP is being controlled around 95/65 and the pacemaker limits are set at 70 min and 110 max.
I feel blessed to be in this current situation. I also feel very privileged to have had access and funding to top medical practitioners, hospitals and special support staff, who have all had major influences in my recovery so far.
As a target, I look forward to another 5/8 years of work (I am 67 now), and by interacting with the arrhythmic group being put in place, to be able to possibly support, encourage, and be able to testify to the goodness of the Lord, and be able to demonstrate to patients with heart conditions, that there is a life to live after major traumas.
Basil Bagg