Doctor's don't agree

[bcgriffin]

In March of this year I went to my regular physcian for left arm pain, she did an EKG and called an ambulance.  At the hospital I had all the test, blood workup, Echo, EKG, they said everything was fine.  They did tell me that my sugar and tryglycerides were too high.  They sent me home with prescriptions for Lopressor, Lisinipril, Metformin and Tricor.  I had a nuclear stress test done in April and it came back fine too.  They took me off the Lopressor.  I have been keeping my sugar down and to date have lost 12 pounds.  This past Tuesday, I started having chest pain.  I took the nitro's like they told me too but they didn't help so I went to the hospital.  They did an EKG and gave me 2 nitros.  The doctor said there were slight changes in my EKG and transferred me to a larger hospital.  Before we left they put me on a nitro drip.  I get to the other hospital and they said I was too young to be having heart problems and said it was GERD.  I have had GERD since I was 30, I am 40 now and have always taken my meds like I'm suppose too.  They did blood workup, and said my potassium was low so gave me postassium pills and did an Echo Stress Test, they said it was fine and that they were diagnosing me with GERD and gave me 2 prescriptions for Nitrostat and Asprin.  My doctor is apalled, he said that nitro can actual make GERD worse.  So now I have 1 doctor who says it's GERD and my doctor and the hospital ER doctor saying it's a heart problem.  
I am getting a second opinion from a new Cardiologist next week.
Has any one ever been diagnosed with GERD and put on Nitro and asprin for it?  I think it's a heart problem.

[kenkeith]

I have heard the pain can be very severe.  

[bcgriffin]

I get the massive headache with nitro. I noticed that my blood pressure had actually dropped to normal limits when I was on the nitro drip and I even did the echo stress test while on the nitro drip. It was the only time during the 2 days that my chest wasn't bothering me, but boy was my headache bad.

[kenkeith]

Nitro can help some forms of esophageal spasm.  Nitroglycerin is used with esophageal spasms (GERD). It is the one non heart related illness that nitroglycerin works in. However, that doesn't rule out a concomitant heart condition.

Nitroglycerin is a vasodilator not only for your heart vessels but for the vascular system which then subsquently lowers your blood pressure. It even dilates the vessels in the brain which then usually gives the side effect of the headache also.  Fortunately, I don't have any side effects, but many people avoid nitro due to the head ache effect and that is a problem!

[ed34]

Brings back memories for me. When I spent 5 weeks in hospital I had junior doctors
saying things like "your heart has dead tissue", "the small vessels leading into heart
tissue are blocked and nothing can be done", "there is nothing can be done for your
condition". I spent hours arguing with them and insisting the consultant visit me. I
received an apology from the consultant with the excuse that the juniors were looking
at the wrong set of notes. From what I was being told, Im surprised I didnt have heart
failure with the fright.

[mammo]

No, this isn't right!  Too often women are not taken seriously when it comes to heart conditions, and you are not too young to have heart problems.  Glad you're seeing a cardiologist!!