The Canadian health care system is fine. If the weekend wasn't in the way then I would have had my operation two days sooner.
The food wasn't too bad and the people are wonderful and friendly.
The medical equipment is the best and the newest.
It seems that if you survive your first heart attack you go on for years and years, I know many people who have done so.
One of the committee members at the local Miners Welfare (where we train) has had too many attacks to count - apparently now there's nothing left to bypass.
One of his attacks was when he was in the street, just yards from his doctors surgery, so he managed to stagger/crawl straight there - he was seen by a doctor instantly, and an ambulance was called to take him to hospital. A few weeks later he received a letter from the parent company who run the surgery, reprimanding him for going to the surgery whilst having a heart attack - apparently he should have crawled the much greater distance home, because calling the ambulance from the surgery means the surgery get charged for the ambulance!.
Good luck AG, nice to have you back, and I'm sure you're good for years now.
My father had a heart attack a handful of years ago, he's still plugging along as well as he can for a guy that has COPD as well, he takes worse care of himself than you =) Glad to hear you're up at it again.
Hard to say...how many times do you suppose would you have to collapse while getting up to go to the bathroom and make a mess before the the catheter becomes worthwhile?
AudioGuru, glad to hear you got trough it .. as a fellow ex smoker I hope I'll get to 62 before my first ha .. IIRC you are now on the strict diet .. what can we tell ya that you already don't know ... we just hope you are around for another 62, there's bunch of us who still need your help
Hard to say...how many times do you suppose would you have to collapse while getting up to go to the bathroom and make a mess before the the catheter becomes worthwhile?
I think you are misunderstanding the comments about the stent. When they install/insert the stent they place a tube into an artery in your groin and feed the balloon/stent to the location of the blockage. Then they remove the tube/tool from your groin and with me it felt like they were pulling a three inch fire hose out of my groin.
The catheter I think you're talking about goes in a much different place.