Bert Palacheck

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Dad had some shortness of breath a couple of weeks ago and was hospitalized for a couple of days in the Park Falls hospital.  While he was there it was discovered that he had some fluid around his heart, a rapid irregular heart beat and a bad heart valve.  They released him after a couple of days and gave him some meds to address the fluid and rapid heart beat and had him take an aspirin each day.  They also sent him to a cardiologist in Marshfield and that appointment was on Thursday, Aug. 5.  


The Cardiologist noted that he was in really good shape for a guy his age and was real positive about being able to help.  He boiled the solution strategy down into 2 main parts:


 First is the irregular heart beat that was determined to be atrial flutter.  This increased the risk of stroke so they put him on a blood thinner that will help prevent clot formation and hopefully take care of any that have already started.  He suggested that they perform an ablation procedure where they go through an artery into the heart and somehow take care of the nerves that are causing the irregular heart beat.  He said they have a 95% success rate with this particular procedure and there is low risk to Dad.  This would be done by the Electrophysiologist heart specialists.  


Second is the deteroriating aortic valve.  This can also be fixed by deploying a new valve through his femoral artery and into his heart.  There are a few steps that need to be done before doing this including an angiogram to determine if there are any narrowed portions of the blood vessel they will be deployng the valve through, fixing (stinting) any narrowing in that artery and measuring the artery and heart valve using electronic imaging to insure they put the right size valve in.  This would be done by the Structural heart specialists.


Dad is doing pretty well.  He says that he is feeling good.  He gets a little short of breath from time to time but he walked a long way in the clinic for his appointment.  He really enjoys visitors and loves to talk with people.