Patient Story of Bruce Hodges

My Story

About Me (In My Own Words)

I first was diagnosed with a coarctation of the thoracic aorta in 1969 and had a repair done at the site of the coarctation the same year. There was repair done with a dacron patch and I was fortunate enough to be able to resume my life as an active teenager playing rugby and all other sports - i even subsequently spent a year as a foreign exchange student in the USA and played football there. I had no issues until I became ill in 1980 and they found that the cords that support my mitral valve had ruptured and it was replaced with a pig valve. This lasted four years but calcified and tore and had to be replaced with a prosthetic St Judes valve which is still ticking away. In the mid 1990s I again fell ill with a fever and was admitted to hospital with a 'mystery illness'. I was transferred to Brisbane to Prince Charles hospital - the site of all my previous surgeries and again came into contact with the surgeon who had done all three of my previous surgeries. He very quickly diagnosed an issue at the site of the original coarctation repair which was confirmed through an MRI - one of the first done in Queensland. (how times have changed). I had developed an aneurism where the original repair had been done and to fix it a sizeable chunk of my aorta was replaced with a graft which is still working fine. To complicate my story even further I was born with a bicuspid aortic valve which has slowly deteriorated over the years and today I have my annual stress echo test to see where I am at. Twelve months ago the pressure gradient across the valve was beginning to cause some concerns and I am looking forward to finding out where it is at today. I remain in the workforce - am an educator and currently also undertaking a PhD. Most importantly my daughter is about to deliver our second grand child any day now - so life is pretty good. I seem to have been at the end of the line when they handed out cardiovascular systems but such is life and I am yet another testament to the skill of the professionals who work in the cardiac space. Onward and upward!