reactions to stents

[dwest66]

My dad has had 5 stents in less than two weeks put in. Each time he has the stents added, 3-4 days later he has a heart attack. Could his body be rejecting the stents? Also, he is in 3rd stage kidney failure, are the stent procedures further damaging his kidneys?

[jrbon]

To my knowledge, pulse rate it is not related with number of stents.

More important is medication and overall health.

Jesus

[time1234]

my dad had gone under a stent surgery in 2004 then again in 2008 then 2011 and now 2012 again what should be the pulse rate and his age is 54 he has total 5 stents now. waiting for reply plz reply asap

[kenkeith]

Sorry to hear of your father's medical problems.  Did your father have a heart attack verified with tests, or are you referring to a heart attack symptom of chest pains?  Are the stents with different vessels? Yes, there can be a rejection of a stent implant and that would cause a block and possibly a heart attack

If your father had a heart attack, your father may have already had certain procedures to help him survive his heart attack and diagnose his condition. For example, many heart attack patients have undergone thrombolysis, a procedure that involves injecting a clot-dissolving agent to restore blood flow in a coronary artery. This procedure is administered within a few (usually three) hours of a heart attack. If this treatment isn't done immediately after a heart attack, many patients will need to undergo coronary angioplasty or coronary artery bypass graft surgery later to improve blood supply to the heart muscle.  Were those procedures followed?

The stents shouldn't further damage the kidneys....the stents should benefit a kidney disorder.  However, a kidney disorder can aggrevate a heart condition by increasing the volume of blood and that stesses the heart.  Also, kidney failure can damage vessels that can further complicate mattters.  Whether or not that had role in the series of stent implantation is a doctor's call, but with a kidney disease the vessel of interest may have been damaged to the extent that stents are not the best treatment.  

It sounds reasonable that a stent implant that increases the flow of blood and that flow of blood would have a gradient resistance of a subsequent blockage that will increase the pressure in the segment from the first to the second occlusion. But does that blockage at the second occlusion decrease blood flow through that blockage or increase blood flow? To be a valid hypothesis it seems there would have to be is less blood flow through the second occlusion?!

Hope this gives you some insight into the possible problems asociated with heart attack, stents, kidney disease, etc.  Thanks for sharing and take care.

[ChatterAlly]

In my case, I never had angina pain until after the stent was put in my RCA.  I also had 2 heart attacks after the stent and not before.  I too, thought my body was rejecting the stent.  I had shortness of breath and a feeling that someone was sitting on my chest.  Those were the symptoms that sent me to the doctor and it was found that my RCA was 95% blocked.  Just after the stent was placed, I had the most excruciating chest pain and I screamed.  The doctor looked at the monitors and said "It must be your back".  No it wasn't!  It was in my heart!  But they seem to always be right and we are wrong.  I developed angina after that, and ended up in the ER a few times only to be told it was not a heart attack. So, I don't know.  I guess some do better than others with stents. The chest pain I have been dealing with lately is being caused by hearrt spasms. But with your father, like Ed said, he must be getting more blockages in a short period of time.  Maybe do a search on what Ed read about the stents causing blockages further down. Have they put him on any meds?  You didn't say if he was.  Take care, Ally

[ed34]

From what you are saying, and if I'm interpreting it correctly, each time your Father has a heart attack they put in another stent and now he has a total of five?
If this is the case then it isn't the stents causing the problems because new ones are being added. It would seem he is forming either clots or serious blockages in a very short period of time. Has he made considerable life style changes to try and prevent this? such as healthy diet, blood pressure/cholesterol level monitoring? does he smoke? If they have used drug eluting stents then he should be on Clopidogrel (plavix) with his aspirin anyway, which should really reduce the risk of forming clots.
There is something else which comes to mind, which I read a paper about some time ago. There was a patient in a similar situation and the cardiologist wrote a paper stating how the first stent seemed to start some kind of chain reaction. The artery in question was quite heavily diseased and the first stent increased blood flow/pressure causing a plaque rupture further down, blocking the vessel. This was stented, but another rupture further down occurred within a couple of days causing yet another blockage. This went on until 4 stents were inserted and things calmed down.