Rene T
Site Team
Sorry for the long post.
This subject came up a few weeks ago and I said I’d be back when I know more.
My DW has AFIB. She had the ablation done 2 years ago. It helped her AFIB almost totally. Once in a while her heart will go out of rythum but it usually only last a few seconds then it stabilizes on its own. We’ll after having the procedure, her cardiologist put her on blood thinners. This was to help stop any clotting of the blood.
Whenever she would cut herself it took a little to get the bleeding to stop and the medication wasn’t cheap .
Without the blood thinner, there was always a chance of her blood clotting in her heart and that clot could work it’s way to her brain and cause her to have a stroke.
Fast forward now and 4 months ago while in her cardiologist office in Fl, we happen to see a large poster on the door about a implant called the Watchman. What it is, everyone has a small pouch or sack on the left side of the heart called the Left Atrial Appendage. The pouch doesn’t do anything for the heart. What it does do is it gives a place for a blood clot start and when that happens like I said it could go to the brain and give you a stroke.
What this watchman does is seals off the opening to this pouch so if blood does clot inside this pouch, it can’t come out. It looks similar to a round parachute. They go in through the groin with a surgical instrument and work it’s way up to the heart. Once it’s positioned in front of this pouch, they deploy the implant and it opens up and seals off the opening to this pouch. After a few weeks, the heart grows skin over this device and permanently seals off the opening. The device stays right there forever. Now if a clot forms it can’t come out.
This device is a little bit bigger than a quarter. I think there are about six sizes. The doctor measures the opening and picks the size necessary. It has been approved by the FDA since 2015.
Well she had it done yesterday. There aren’t many doctors trained to do this yet. Her cardiologist here in NH is in a group of 30 doctors and only 2 are trained to do this procedure. Her doctor has done over 1(0 so far.
In 45 days, she’ll see the doctor again and he’ll most likely take her off the blood thinner for good. That’s the goal.
The procedure took just about 1 hour and she had to spend the there.
One of the interesting fact is that a person who has AFIB and is not on blood thinners, are 5 times more likely to have a stroke than a person without out AFIB. Think about that.
So if you are in blood thinners and would like to get off from it, talk to your cardiologist and see if you are a candidate.
I have to go pick her up this morning. I wasn’t able to go in the hospital to be with her because of that stupid Covid but she sounded real good when I spoke to her last night. Any questions, don’t hesitate to ask.
This subject came up a few weeks ago and I said I’d be back when I know more.
My DW has AFIB. She had the ablation done 2 years ago. It helped her AFIB almost totally. Once in a while her heart will go out of rythum but it usually only last a few seconds then it stabilizes on its own. We’ll after having the procedure, her cardiologist put her on blood thinners. This was to help stop any clotting of the blood.
Whenever she would cut herself it took a little to get the bleeding to stop and the medication wasn’t cheap .
Without the blood thinner, there was always a chance of her blood clotting in her heart and that clot could work it’s way to her brain and cause her to have a stroke.
Fast forward now and 4 months ago while in her cardiologist office in Fl, we happen to see a large poster on the door about a implant called the Watchman. What it is, everyone has a small pouch or sack on the left side of the heart called the Left Atrial Appendage. The pouch doesn’t do anything for the heart. What it does do is it gives a place for a blood clot start and when that happens like I said it could go to the brain and give you a stroke.
What this watchman does is seals off the opening to this pouch so if blood does clot inside this pouch, it can’t come out. It looks similar to a round parachute. They go in through the groin with a surgical instrument and work it’s way up to the heart. Once it’s positioned in front of this pouch, they deploy the implant and it opens up and seals off the opening to this pouch. After a few weeks, the heart grows skin over this device and permanently seals off the opening. The device stays right there forever. Now if a clot forms it can’t come out.
This device is a little bit bigger than a quarter. I think there are about six sizes. The doctor measures the opening and picks the size necessary. It has been approved by the FDA since 2015.
Well she had it done yesterday. There aren’t many doctors trained to do this yet. Her cardiologist here in NH is in a group of 30 doctors and only 2 are trained to do this procedure. Her doctor has done over 1(0 so far.
In 45 days, she’ll see the doctor again and he’ll most likely take her off the blood thinner for good. That’s the goal.
The procedure took just about 1 hour and she had to spend the there.
One of the interesting fact is that a person who has AFIB and is not on blood thinners, are 5 times more likely to have a stroke than a person without out AFIB. Think about that.
So if you are in blood thinners and would like to get off from it, talk to your cardiologist and see if you are a candidate.
I have to go pick her up this morning. I wasn’t able to go in the hospital to be with her because of that stupid Covid but she sounded real good when I spoke to her last night. Any questions, don’t hesitate to ask.
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from the inside to check the implant. The Doc said everything looks good and he took her off the blood thinner. He put her on a baby aspirin, which she’ll be in forever, and on Plavix for the next 6 months. It’s a mild dose of blood thinner. She’ll be on this for 6 months then he’ll take her off that. All is good right now
