I was sitting this afternoon at work when I received a call from my sister with the news. As the title suggests, my dad had gone in that afternoon with chest pains, and sure enough, he had a heart attack. I passed by three people as I bolted out the door to the hospital and told them what happened. When I got there we had about ten agonizing minutes of waiting before the cardiologist came and spoke to us. It was a miracle how it happened. He was coded immediately and taken to the cardio cath lab and a stent was placed in his artery. It took all of 17 minutes for that to happen from the time he walked in to the time they were done.
It was bad. His artery that pumps the left main ventricle was blocked. The blood flow stopped completely while they were performing the catheter, so they got there just in time. He is now in stable condition, sedated but in as good of condition as could be hoped for in his situation.
He is extremely lucky to be alive and for circumstances to have been what they were. He works in Kindred, ND, 30 minutes out of Fargo, with no hospital of significance in town. Had he been at the office he would not have made it. Had the golf tournament at the Moorhead Country Club not been rained out last week and been rescheduled for this morning and not this afternoon he would not have made it. Had the tournament not been at the nearest golf course in town he might not have made it. Had he not had two brothers with heart problems(one who died almost immediately after he had it) he might not have had the levelheadedness to go to the hospital emergency room, and he might not have made it. If this was a normal day, my dad would not be alive right now.
As many of you would know, he's not out of the woods yet. The next say/days will tell, but the fact that he has made it this far is a miracle. He is 48, and I am not ready to see him leave. There has been a flurry of phone calls, and my mom is so thankful to have a sister-in-law who is a cardiac nurse to call and ask all the questions and explain to the rest of the family what is going on. They are all in Indiana and we are in North Dakota. We are also so thankful to have a church family that immediately surrounds us physically and emotionally.
Finally, as I sit here at the hospital thankful of my coworkers who set up the wireless network that allows me to make this post this evening, I have to ask you all a favor. For those of you who pray, please do so. Pray for his continued health and for the excellent doctors who are taking care of him. Pray for me and my mom as we stay here but try to get some sleep, and my sister as she and a friend take the day shift while my mom and I go to work tomorrow, and pray for our family and friends as they sit and wait anxiously for the slightest bit of news to hang off of. For the rest of you, keep us in your thoughts.
Thank you all so much.
No tips, just recs.
Updated X1: Last visit before I go to bed. The nurse is trying to let this be night for him before they do some more work at 2 or 3. He bit his tongue somewhere along the line and with the blood thiners that has been manageable but badly bruised. That has calmed down so far and should get better as they begin to take him off medication. The nurse was unsure of what the doctors were planning as far as any more repair work on the heart as they did the angiogram and immediately went to work on the stent. They will review the video in the morning and decide what to do from there. Thank you all so far for the comments and prayers. I will keep you posted in the morning.