Slim's Status

Monday- 1/17/2011

We have created this blog as a way of communicating to family and friends on how Slim is doing. 

To begin-  Late Saturday evening Slim felt some arm, chest and throat/neck pain. He had eaten some spicy food that night and thought it might have been indigestion.  He went to bed and woke up early the next morning to get ready for his church meetings.  He didn't feel any pain.  He then went to his early morning church meetings and felt fine.  He came home about mid morning and started to not feel very good.  He began to experience increased chest pain and suggested to Judy that he should probably go to the ER.  At this point he had a significant increase in pain and collapsed to his knees.  Judy then realized that she wouldn't be able to get him to the ER and called 911.

Once the paramedics arrived they immediately gave him 2 baby aspirin and some nitroglycerin spray.  This dramatically decreased his pain.  While in the ER he underwent some testing. He was actually starting to feel pretty good and thought he would be able to go home.  His blood work showed some elevated enzymes that are indicative of having heart stress.  They decided to admit him overnight for observation.

Monday Morning-  Slim had a rough night.  The chest pain came back and they had to place a nitroglycerin patch on his chest to alleviate the pain.  Blood work this morning was again positive for elevated enzymes related to having a heart attack.  In fact, the enzyme levels had significantly increased... meaning that he definitely had had another heart attack. Possibly two.  They performed an EKG and it didn't show any signs of an obstruction.  They then took him to the Cath lab to perform another procedure to see if they could find out where in the heart the blockage was occurring.  The results of this procedure showed that he had several arteries that were obstructed. A couple of them have over a 90% blockage.

After consulting with the physician regarding his options, it was felt that the bypass surgery would provide the best potential outcome. (The location of the blockages would put too many stints too close together.)  They will need to bypass 5 arterial areas. They would have taken him into surgery this morning except that Slim has been on Plavix (a blood thinner) since his first heart attack in April.  So... They need to wait until Friday before they can perform the surgery.  In the meantime he will stay in the hospital to manage his pain and to monitor his heart.

The good news-   He was quick again to get into the hospital and at this point it doesn't appear that there is any long-term heart damage.

We will try to post updates daily if not several times a day.
Thanks for all your prayers, love and support.

Jaren