Dear Doctors & Friends,
My father is 79 years old and has had multiple heart attacks beginning approximately 15 years ago when he was airlifted to the Arizona Heart Institute in Phoenix, AZ. Within the last 10-12 years, he has had 3 angioplasty(?) procedures, i.e "balloons" to remover blockages. Has been on multiple meds including Toprol (?) & daily doses of nitro. He moved to the south to live near my older sister & me appx. 3 years ago. Within the last 18 months has been rushed to hospital twice for heart attacks. On the first visit, they took him down for heart cath with 3 surgeons were standing by ready to do angio/balloon, put in stents, or bypass, whichever they determined necessary as consent was given to whatever they felt was best. Well, they brought him back to the room without doing anything. NOTHING. They told my sister and I that he was not a candidate for any further procedures as his arteries we too small and too deterioated for stents, likewise too deterioated for balloon, and that overall, his heart was too damaged and too weak for bypass surgery, that he would not survive the surgery. They adjusted his meds, increased his daily nitro and sent him home. On the second occasion, they didn't even do a cath. Just got him through the worst of it, increased his daily nitro again and sent him home. On this occasion, they told us that his Left Coronary Artery, I think they called it the LCD (?) was totally blocked, a "total and complete occlusion." They told us that this particular artery is commonly called "the Widow-maker" and that he is lucky to even be alive at this point, that he is basically "on borrowed time." They did tell us that a couple of smaller arteries have attempted a crude form of natural bypass around the LCD and that's probably the only reason he survived. However, they were quick to indicate that these smaller feeder arteries would not be able to do the work of the LCD for an extended period of time. He has done pretty well for the last 6 months; however, seem to be declining rapidly now. I say this because within the last month he has started experiencing swelling in his legs, a first time for this, bloodwork showed that his potassium was depleted and he was placed on potassium therapy, and has been complaining of intermittent nausea. As of this week, he is complaining of numbness in his left leg. As a result, he is scheduled to see the doctor tomorrow. My sister and I fear that all of these odd symptoms may be indicators that another attack is coming soon. Are these symptoms: leg swelling, low potassium levels, intermittent nausea and numbness in left leg, symptoms or rather, precursers indicating that his conditon is getting worse and/or that another heart episode is soon to occur?? If so, or even if not, what are the signs that we should be watching out for, warning signs so to speak that he is getting close to another episode and/or perhaps coming to the end of his life. We don't want to lose him obviously, but have accepted the inevitable. At this point, we just want to know what we can expect to occur and in what order? What are things that will give us a "warning" that something is about to occur or that he is definetely getting worse?? We just want someone to be straight-forward with us and give us a realistic description of how this will progress until the "end." Please give me some honest information without the sugar-coating and the patronizing pat on the back like our southern gentleman doctors are so fond of doing. We are grown women and can take hard facts. We just want and NEED to know what the prognosis is, what are some things we can be watching for and we can expect to occur...
THANK YOU!!!!