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Tom's StoryHi, my name is Tom Heap and I want to share my experience of having a quadruple heart bypass operation. It was one Sunday morning April/May 2003 and as usual I was going to the newsagents for our Sunday morning newspaper when I suddenly experienced severe chest pains. Putting this down to the fact that I have a Hiatus Hernia and we had been out the night before for a few drinks and a curry I didn’t pay much attention to this pain. I arrived back home and took some antacid medicine to relieve the pain and eventually the pain subsided. However this pain remained with me for most of the day. I went to work as normal the following day and felt ok until later on that evening on my way home from work, when once again I experienced the same sort of pain again, but this time it was much worse. I immediately telephoned the doctors who advised me to get there straight away, which I proceeded to do. Once at the doctors I was given an ECG, which seemed to be fine. The doctor stated she thought it was angina and gave me a spray to alleviate symptoms and booked me for some tests at the local hospital the Royal Bolton, for blood tests and a treadmill reading. The tests were inconclusive and I had to have further tests .which included a heart scan and eventually an angiogram; this was done at Manchester Royal Infirmary. At this stage the cardiac specialist still thought there was nothing too serious until he received the results of the angiogram. His next words were “I apologise I didn’t think there was anything too serious but having reviewed your tests it is evident that you require surgery in the form of a quadruple heart bypass as you have one artery completely blocked, one 80% blocked, one 60% blocked and one 40% blocked. Obviously I was in shock as I was only 51years old Time passed and the operation was scheduled for November and would be performed at Manchester. It was explained in detail before hand that I would be in intensive care for approx 24 hours. This wasn’t the case as I had great difficulty breathing normally after the operation. Again various doctors came and went studying notes until one said “It says in your notes you are a non smoker, is that correct?” Yes I replied, to which the next question was, what is your job? I have worked in the pub and catering trade for most of my life, ah, passive smoking is probably the cause. So I had to spend a total of 4 days in intensive care before being moved to HDU.,24 hours later the normal cardiac ward. The following day during ward rounds the surgeon said “My you look 100% better than you did 2 -3 days ago” I said I felt fine and he asked me what were my circumstances at home, I explained that my wife worked as a Health Care Assistant in Thoracic Medicine at the Royal Bolton Hospital and was immediately discharged. I saw a District Nurse once after my discharge and luckily have been fine since although I was off work for 6-7 months and gave up pubs and catering and now have two part-time jobs, one cleaning and one as a sales assistant in a gents clothes shop. Tom You are here: Home >> Your Stories >> Tom's Story |
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