[janieliza]

I had my first balloon angioplasty in 1994. I had ignored the presentation tape that tells you what to expect, and then tried to get up when the dye was put in and I felt like I was being parboiled. The doctor sat on me to prevent me from ripping the line out of my femoral artery. They completed the procedure with me asleep. I had very little pain... just around the insertion point.

The second one was in July, 2006. I didn't have a cardiac doctor at the time because I had moved and was in the process of contracting a house for us to live in. I was assigned to one of the youngest doctors in the practice of 16 cardiologists. The doctor could not get the line into my 90% closed artery. I should say here that I'm rather petite to begin with. When I was asked to walk, I didn't realize that I would be able to do it so quickly. I had not lost any capacity for exercise... but I tired easily. The local heart care group was a tightly controlled LLC that didn't allow any former members to practice in the area, so the interaction between that group and the ONLY hospital that had a rotary angioplasty blade was very poor. The hospital refused to allow members from the LLC to use their facilities. Since my angioplasty had failed, I was extremely short of breath and constantly anxious about what might happen if ....

I went around both groups by changing my insurance affiliation to the one at the other hospital. Three months later I had a similar claudication while running after my dogs and had to call 911. I had not taken the time to get a cardiologist with the new healthcare group, so I went with the doctor on call that day. I told him about the failure and their inability to get to use the blade. He used the blade on my LAD and opened it up nicely I thought. I had very little pain at the insertion site with its star closure. Shortness of breath didn't stop. My doc told me I needed a transfusion. I refused it, thinking that I was healthy enough to replenish my own even from hemoglobin=9. Bad idea. For the next two years I struggled with iron tablets twice daily and barely made it to a 10. I couldn't walk any uphill climbs nor fastwalk. Pretty soon I developed a pain in my throat when I tried. I also had 8-9 polips on my thyroid, so I thought the pain was caused by blood vessels in my thyroid. NOT.

It was referred pain, my first actual pain from the heart.

Another year passed and I only walked about once every two weeks, and then only when prodded by my husband. I had to stop often. My cardiologist had left the area and I knew I was going to need one soon, so I asked for a referral from my internal med doc. He told me the emergency room visit I had the week before didn't sound like a heart problem, more like an ulcer or my GERD But he wanted me to do a stress test. I was hesitant because the last time before I moved here, the docs and techs left the room while I was at level three of the stress test... for forty minutes (I take a beta blocker for a fast heartbeat that started when I was 44). When they finally came back, I begged them to let my stop. I could not move for nearly 15 minutes afterward. That frightened me so much that I refused physical stress tests afterward. But this doc insisted that it be a physical stress test.

The echo cardiograph was supposed to show improved detail according to the online descriptions, so I went to the stress test hopeful that I would find out if the two drug eluting stents my previous doc had put in were still working well. The doc told me my results showed no blockage... but then he looked at the elevated ST waves on the EKG and began thinking about the neck pain. He said I should have an angiogram.

It turned into an angioplasty. One of the nurses had mentioned that this doc was a type A personality. I was aware of that since I had been four minutes late to one appointment and he left the building to see patients... I'd waited forty minutes on him to get on schedule in the previous appointment, so I didn't realize it would cramp his style enough that he would be that petulant.

During the procedure I realized that he was jamming the line into my femoral artery so hard that I could feel it hit the bifurcation of the aorta below my navel. I told him it hurt and asked him to slow it down. He said that was just how he did it and didn't change his speed or thrust. I tried to fade into sleep but couldn't. He did the balloon angioplasty and then started threading the stent. I didn't realize that it failed. He knew the previous angioplasty had used the rotary blade, but he opted to not place a stent. He said it was a 90% blockage and that I had another at 80% in another artery but that it was a very narrow artery and he didn't expect to get the balloon in. In closing the femoral artery, he created significant pain from compression. Apparently he didn't use the star closure. I'm bruised and tender from my navel down both femoral arteries. He prescribed a month's worth of nitroglycerin patches. Headaches and throbbing may force me to stop them.

My pre-angio and first post-angio CBC showed 10.7 hemo. The next morning it had dropped to 10. At checkout time it had gone to 10.1. I'm a few hours from walking again. I'm wondering if I should find a new doctor before the routine week-after appointment. This doc seems rooted in the dark ages, stubborn and I suspect hateful. This was my fourth angioplasty... I never had this much intentionally caused pain. I didn't expect him to walk on water... but I thought docs had an oath not to do things that harmed the patient.

Am I wrong?