Tag Archives: cardiology

It’s been a very strange year…

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It’s just a few days shy of the one-year anniversary of experiencing the still unexplained tachycardia that started me down what feels like a very long and often unfulfilling series of medical appointments and major life changes. As June 28th looms larger on the horizon, I’m still not sure what to make of the experience. Maybe it’s not surprising to anyone else but learning that I am not actually indestructible came as something of an unwelcome surprise. 

I won’t say that I ever considered myself particularly healthy, but I always felt robust and strong as a bull moose. I rarely gave much thought to my physical limits. This experience has forced me to confront both human fragility and the illusion of invincibility I once held. Every medical appointment since has been a reminder of my body’s unpredictability, and despite numerous tests and consultations, the cause of my tachycardia remains elusive. This uncertainty has become a constant background noise in my life.

Each day carries a mix of hope and frustration, as I swing between optimism that the next appointment might bring answers and the annoyance of another inconclusive result. It’s a challenge to remain patient and positive when the path to wellness feels never-ending. Often, the struggle between my own ears is as or more problematic than the physical one.

As June 28th approaches, marking a year since this parade of fuckery, I find myself reflecting on the life changes that have accompanied it. Adjusting my lifestyle to accommodate both the knowns and the unknows has meant altering routines that felt as natural as breathing. From dietary changes and new exercise regimes to prioritizing rest and stress management, the shifts have been both major and minor but always impactful. The experience has reshaped my understanding of health and well-being and the surprisingly delicate balance required to maintain it. 

A year later I wish I had better answers than, “well, as long as the incidents aren’t recurring, keep doing what you’re doing.” Patience in the face of uncertainty has never been one of my strengths. This experience hasn’t improved that at all. As I gain some distance from the events that launched this ridiculousness, pondering on what it all means and what’s going to happen has receded to manageable proportions rather than filling a dominate place in my daily thoughts. That has gone a long way to letting me make the mental leap to getting back to what now passes for normal.

Diagnostic tests, doctor shopping, and medical snobbery…

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Since my original diagnosis of “probable SVT” way back in July took place under the umbrella of the ChristianaCare hospital system over in Delaware, my first appointment with cardiology was also made within their system. That was fine. Their main campus is reasonably well reviewed and I could get seen by a cardiology nurse practitioner in August, which I’ve found out through this process is a fast turnaround for a new cardiology patient who isn’t inactively laying in a hospital bed. 

In the intervening days and weeks, though, I had a follow up with my primary care doctor, who operates as part of the Johns Hopkins system. He was less enthused about my decision to use Christiana for my cardiology needs – explaining that their cardiology department, while fine, is “not ranked” whereas Hopkins cardiology is currently ranked 13th in the nation with the hospital consistently ranking very near the top of any list of “America’s best hospitals” that’s ever put together.

Yes, my primary care doctor is a medical snob.

Despite his cajoling, I kept my original appointment, which led through a series of tests and reports that I was going to need anyway. I also reached out to Hopkins Cardiology to get myself on their waiting list for new patients and ended up with an appointment scheduled deep into October. It wasn’t ideal, but since I was going through all the preliminary tests and could then hand over a pretty good sized file, the timing wasn’t a major issue for me. I was able to take advantage of their wait list option to get my first appointment in the books last week – with a guy who has been practicing for 40+ years and has the look and feel of someone who has seen just about everything. In other words, he’s exactly the guy I want even if all we’re doing at the moment is preventative and exploratory. 

With all other things being equal, if being able to access some of the best cardiologists in the country means driving 45 minutes west instead of 25 minutes east, ultimately it feels like not much of a decision at all. 

It turns out, like my primary care doctor, I too am a medical snob.

So, I’m going all in. My optometrist recently retired. Instead of going over to the doctor that took over his practice, I’ll let Hopkins run the show for my eyes too. I’ve got my first appointment set up with the closest branch of the Wilmer Eye Institute later this year. That puts all but one doc under a single banner… and when the time comes sometime in 2024, I’ll bring that one into the fold too.

All of these new faces on my medical team are a little further away than I’d like, but I feel like what I’ll lose in adding a few minutes of extra travel time, will pay me back in the convenience of having them all working under the same organization. I was woefully unprepared for the level of coordination I’d need to do myself when my primary care doc and everyone else had electronic records systems that refused to communicate with each other. 

I’m in no way fool enough to believe that being “nationally ranked” is any guarantee of better outcomes. For now, it appears that most of my problems are fairly benign, but should something become more involved or I develop a novel condition over time, I’m going to put my faith in the big name going forward. Hopefully they’re not just riding their 135-year-old reputation. 

Some people would take this opportunity to rail against the American healthcare system. Undoubtedly, it has challenges – but I’ve been absolutely amazed by the level of services and the array of options that have been presented to me over the last three months. Don’t think for a moment I’ve failed to realize my great good fortune to have both the geographic proximity to one of America’s great medical centers and an insurance plan that makes walking through their doors possible. There hasn’t been a day go past recently when it hasn’t been at the forefront of my thoughts.

Security blanket…

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For the last five weeks I’ve had an electronic security blanket. Far away, wherever Philips giant data center is located, computers monitored the output from their Mobile Cardiac Outpatient Telemetry (MCOT) devices, and their algorithm has been plugging along keeping a remote eye on my ticker. 

The only feedback this little wonder device gave me was that occasionally one of the leads came unstuck and needed to be reaffixed. I’ve just been operating under the assumption that if there was something catastrophic happening, someone might have called or cut the testing short. I have no idea if that’s true or not, but in the absence of clear guidance, I’ve created my own. 

I hate to admit it, but I felt just a little bit better with this little bit of plastic and silicon chips quietly doing its thing in the background.

The fact is, these last two months have been the only time in my adult life I’ve honestly been bothered by living alone. The only difference from June 28th to today is the fact that I now have evidence that something could go horribly wrong rather than simply knowing it as a purely intellectual exercise. That evidence is enough to leave me feeling decidedly uneasy now that my security blanket has gone away. 

Taken as a whole, the last two and a half months have been disconcerting in a way I’d haven’t previously encountered. I don’t know that there’s anything to be done about it other than to accept that I’ll now have a new nagging thought in the back of my head for the foreseeable future. Moving someone in just to make sure I haven’t accidentally dropped dead as I go about my day-to-day activities, feels like it’s probably a wildly excessive overreaction… but don’t think the thought and a hundred other derivative ideas haven’t been banging around my head this weekend. 

Anyway, I kind of miss my security blanket.