First post:
Dec 26, 2019 Latest post:
Jun 29, 2020
Bruce had both his mitral and tricuspid valve repaired at Abbott Northwestern Hospital on September 13th, 2019. The surgery was very successful, and he had a short five day stay in the hospital. He returned home and began physical therapy and quickly regained his strength. Shortly after he began to notice his heart rate increasing and shortness of breath. At his 10 week post-operative appointment he had an ECHO and his cardiologist determined that he was once again experiencing severe mitral regurgitation. After many consultations he found out that he would need to have open heart surgery once again to fix the issue. His cardiologist and surgeon did not know the exact cause but most likely a cord from the device that was implanted tore from the heart muscle.
On December 23rd he had the surgery to fix the device that was placed on his mitral valve in September. His surgeon and cardiologist thought that a cord on the device had torn from the heart muscle and wasn't helping the valve close, causing the blood to flow back into the heart. The surgeon wouldn't know exactly what was causing the regurgitation until the surgery and would decide at that time if they would do a repair or replacement.
During the surgery Dr Askew repaired a tear in his valve which ended up being the cause of the leak. The cord was still intact and had not ripped away. Unfortunately other complication and issues have occurred throughout the surgery and his recovery. These set backs have all been handled by the great team of doctors, nurses and heart experts at Abbott. The following journal entries detail the events of the past few days.
