Ellen's Journal

Hello everyone, it has been 4 months since my husband’s surgery.  It was performed on 9/30/2022.  We hit a bump right before the surgery and Jim had to go in for an emergency root canal.   This lead to being on antibiotics and a lot of NSAIDs for pain.  Fast forward, this caused two duodenum ulcers.  These ulcers bled post surgery as they put him on Eliquis due to afib.   This lead to a longer hospital stay and then when he was discharged on 10/10/22, he had to return on 10/15 for a blood transfusion due to severe anemia.  Ultimately, the heart surgery was smooth and our surgeon was very thorough. 

Anyway, after several weeks of back and forth by my daughter and I, Jim was eventually released to come home.  Things have been fairly smooth.  His ulcers were treated and have resolved.  We just receive lab work back that confirmed his anemia is all resolved as well.  He did have to go through blood transfusions initially (total of 4) and we are very grateful for blood donors and the fact we got through all of that.  The doctor’s, our surgeon, the hospital staff, were all on it and took great care of Jim.

Currently Jim is fighting off a cold which is no fun.  Post surgery he had a cough that was caused by the EGD.  It hung around until January and finally resolved only to have a cough from this cold bug.  At least he isn’t dealing with the healing of his chest this time.  He is on Metoprolol and aspirin.  He has had a couple of odd heart beats here and there, but so far so good.  He goes in for a 5 month check on 2/14/23…gotta love that it’s on Valentines Day.

Sometimes it’s hard for me to even believe we made it through a second surgery.  Time seems so surreal…I continue to pray for his confidence to build in this surgery outcome.  Since his first one failed, it makes it challenging to feel the confidence that all is good…that this valve will last.

I remind myself every day - one step at a time.

Hello Everyone, I wanted to provide an update on our new aortic valve stenosis journey.  We just met our new surgeon, Dr. Sharma.  He is with Mercy General Hospital in Sacramento.  He evaluated Jim’s CT and said that his bigger concern is the bovine valve.  That although the Aorta is indeed dilated, it’s not the main issue.  At this time he puts Jim at moderate to severe stenosis stage.  This is just slightly over three years from when it was installed, March of 2019.

Dr. Sharma stated that based on Jim’s overall physical size, the Edwards Bovine Valve that installed is too small (23mm).  He said this does create a situation where stenosis can set in much faster.  He also said that given Jim’s age, he just turned 59 (so considered young) that stenosis can appear faster.

The procedure Dr. Sharma is recommending is AVR with root enlargement, he will install a 25 mm valve (Edwards), fix the Aorta, do a Maze procedure and a LAA (left atrial appendage) ligation.  He talked to us about an increased chance of a pacemaker.  Went over all the risks of course.  

When he first walked in and saw Jim his comment was, “Wow, you are very fit.”  We run a construction company and Jim is owner/operator - he never sits down.  He asked if Jim was having any symptoms and at this time our answer was no.  Dr. Sharma is going to have, or perhaps already has had, a conversation with our cardiologist Dr. Joshi.  They will determine the best time for surgery at this point.  My understanding is Dr. Sharma is two months out - it’s really crazy as he said he alone is doing 4 heart surgeries a week I believe.  He did say however, that if Dr. Joshi tells him to get Jim in sooner he will do so. 

He was wonderfully reassuring.  Our original surgery was performed at another hospital (Mercy San Juan) and he shared confidently, that Jim’s this experience, at Mercy General, will be very different - it will be more positive. He even spent time talking to Jim about his past trauma around the surgery and how he understood - he was very compassionate and sorry that we were back so soon discussing another surgery.

So, all in all - even if we are back way too soon for this we at least feel good about the surgeon and how it’s being handled.  It’s a bit uncomfortable knowing the bovine valve failed and that it could again.  Dr. Sharma will be setting up Jim’s heart so if the valve fails early again they will be able to do a “fix” using a wire.  We didn’t go into this in detail so I’m not sure what that meant.  He also said his heart will be setup to receive another valve, if needed, without another open heart surgery.  Too bad that wasn’t done the first time around.

Thank you everyone for listening.  This is de-ja vu for us and not at all comfortable.  We are blessed to have such an incredible support system around us both here in this forum (thank you Adam) and in our personal lives…we won’t be going through it alone.

Hello everyone - Jim’s first surgery was minimally invasive. From what I’m understanding his next surgery will be a full split. Can anyone share any encouraging information on the full split and recovery and how it might be different from the mini-split? My husband is pretty anxious over this and I guess I am as well. Thank you.

My name is Ellen and I wasn’t sure how this worked for the caregivers of heart valve patients. My husband went through his aortic replacement in 03/2019 and we have run into issues with the bovine valve already. We go for follow-up on his CT tomorrow and we’re both pretty uncomfortable. I guess I was just looking for some support. I haven’t updated our profile or story. Just wanted to make sure I was using this platform correctly.