I'm home, better than ever

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Posted by Helen Looft on October 13, 2001 at 17:47:47:

Hi all! I came home on the 8th day from my emergency maze surgery with better than wonderful news. My heart is in sinus rhythm, with p-waves. My heart rate is 67 – 72 bpm (my normal rate was 42 even when I was much younger, before a-fib) - no pacemaker needed! The sinus node seems to be working fine and the mitral value prolaspe fixed it self as soon as I was in sinus rhythm.
Dr. Bechman told my family that when he opened my chest my heart was in a-fib and it was a GREY QUIVERING MASS. It looked very unhealthy. He put me on bypass and performed the maze. After that he smoothed out what I think is called an artial lip which is a nook in the atrium where blood was pooling and was most likely where the clot was formed that gave me a stroke 9 months ago. Dr. Bechman said that after the smoothing of the atrium the chance of stroke goes down to almost zero.
When I came off bypass, Dr. Bechman said that my heart pinked up immediately and had a very strong beat with good compression. He believes there is no permanent damage from the a-fib and the surgery was a complete success. He said that it was possible that my heart would momentarily slip into a-fib for the next 30 days or so while the incisions in the atria are still healing, which it hasn’t done yet, but after that I shouldn’t experience a-fib ever again.
The part that truly amazed me is that through the surgery and recovery, I was never in any real pain. I am, however, extremely tired and weak, and I overexert myself easily. I am resting and regaining strength slowly. I am thrilled to be off all medicines and I have to pinch myself to believe it’s real. Best wishes to all…

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