I arrived at our local hospital's emergency room frightened and desperate, hoping against hope that the pain in my arm was not what I now feared...heart disease.
The receptionist, upon hearing my symptoms, sent me quickly to the admitting nurse, who took my temperature and blood pressure, and asked specific questions about my symptoms. She didn't tell me at the time, but my BP was off the charts. However, the pain in my arm was dissipating and was completely gone by the time I was ushered to an ER bed. From then until I returned home four days later, I never had another pain. My prayer had been answered.
This time, an electrocardiogram revealed an abnormality. Blood was drawn. I was hooked up to a nitroglycerin drip. I was given a shot of blood thinner. All sorts of things were happening that unnerved me. But I had no pain.
It was determined that I needed a catheter test Wednesday morning to see what was going on with my heart. The procedure wasn't bad, since I was given a sedative that sent me to La La Land...not asleep, but in a dreamlike state. The worst part of the test was having to keep my right leg absolutely still for six hours afterwards.
The results were that I had a 95% blockage in one of my arteries that would require angioplasty and a stent.
The heart doctor on duty that night visited me to interview me about my lifestyle and to let me know I'd need a procedure to open the blocked artery. He told me that the doctor who performs that procedure was in Hawaii on vacation, and so he was sending me by ambulance to a hospital in our state's capital city. I'd be going sometime Wednesday afternoon.
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