Be Here Now

Bad Medicine

So it’s 3 days until I have my ablation procedure.  Honestly I’m scared, not out of my wits; I just have a general feeling of apprehension. I truly believe however, that everything is going to work out really well.

This past year, in regard to this condition, has been very taxing to say the least.  I have lost a ton of money due to absences from work, costly visits to the ER, and regular payments for medications.  I’ve been living the past year with a constant fear of arrhythmias which I no longer can control on my own, thus needing drugs only accessible through an Emergency Room.  My performance at work has declined due to my lack of focus thanks to the Cardizem which keeps my heart beat in check.  On top of this I’ve acquired a very annoying tick in my right eye, which I believe is a direct result of the stress from this condition.

So get this, the original electrophysiologist that was going to perform my ablation procedure is named Dr. Jaswal.  He is a fine person, very personable, and works for Hanneman Hospital.  I have no grudges against this man, but I feel it’s important that I say a few things about his practice.

I chose Dr. Jaswal because he was the closest specialist to my home, out of convenience.  This was a terrible way to choose a specialist that would ultimately be performing a procedure that is potentially life threatening.  There were several things that concerned me about Dr. Jaswal.  The first thing that concerned me was that he was unable to tell me the type of SVT (right chamber or left) I had from an electrocardiogram of my arrhythmia.  Having done some research I found that it should be possible to locate the problem area of the heart by studying the EKG.

The ablation procedure can vary greatly based upon this information.  If the issue is in the right chamber they will insert a catheter into the large artery near your groin, run it into the right chamber, and trigger an arrhythmia via an electrical pulse.  Once in an arrhythmia they can target the problem area and use radio frequency to essentially burn away the tissue causing the problem.

If the problem area is in the left chamber things can be a bit more complicated, to reach the left chamber it is necessary to puncture the membrane that separates the right and left chamber.  Doing so can have adverse effects due to possible blood clotting on the instrumentation.  If this occurs then bad stuff happens when removing the instruments from the chamber, the clots would dislodge from the instruments and shoot directly to my brain, causing a stroke and possibly death.  The chances of this, I’m told, are 1 in 1000.

Dr. Jaswal, as I stated could not tell me where the problem was located and thus couldn’t tell me which procedure would be needed.  He told me that he would know the location once he stimulated the heart and that would tell him where it was.  The problem with this is that in order for blood not too clot on the catheter and thus possibly cause my untimely death; it would be a good idea to take blood thinners before the procedure.  I was not informed of this by Dr. Jaswal but rather by my current electrophysiologist Dr. Marchlinski.

Today I was instructed by Dr. Marchlinkski’s office to start taking 325mg of aspirin every day. Also, I am to discontinue use of my medication in order to facilitate the procedure.  I was never instructed to do this by Dr. Jaswal. In fact I did not hear from the office of Dr. Jaswal until the day before the procedure was to take place, and only after leaving several messages the day before. This is very disconcerting; especially so when you take into account that Dr. Marchlinski’s was able to identify the problem area as the left chamber from the very same EKG that Dr. Jaswal could not.  In order to decrease the chances of the procedure being the end of me, I should be given blood thinners to reduce the ability of by blood to clot on the instruments being placed inside my heart.  I do not believe this would have happened under Dr. Jaswal’s care.

These discoveries were after I was told by Dr. Jaswal’s office that they could not actually get the imaging equipment they wanted to use, and had to check if another piece of equipment would be available that “could” be used but the other preferred.  This was on the day before the procedure that I was informed of this.  That was when I decided I needed to find a new Doctor.  I’m glad this occurred to set off the red flags of WTF.  Without knowing the exact (or close as possible) nature of my condition, I may have had some serious complications that could have been avoided, which at worst could have resulted in my death.

I suppose this goes to show that where health care is concerned, it is a commercial product, and much like any other commercial product it’s a buyer beware scenario…and a possibly lethal scenario at that.