INTRODUCTION

In March 2006, , I was rushed to a renowned Hospital for heart operation. I was 70 years old then. Now I am 80. Prior to this decision I checked up with a cardiologist who conducted various test including treadmill.

I was able to walk on treadmill coping with its varying speed. All the same the doctor decided to conduct angio test. Test result proved that I had two arteries in blocked condition. One artery had 100% block and the second artery had 75% block.

Blood was moving with difficulty in the third artillery which was the smallest of all. Flow of blood through the small artery to the muscles of heart was not sufficient and hence pain was coming whenever the heart was called to pump more blood due to exertion.
 

Then only I could understand that the pain in my chest was an indicator of the blockages in the artery. In fact my heart was crying that it could not cope up with the works.

I used to feel some heaviness in the left side of my chest whenever I walk for more than five minutes. I never used to do any hard work except walking.

Some 10 years before my heart operation I consulted a doctor for the pain in my chest. He suggested that I should stop walking and take rest for a few minutes and then proceed. That is what I was doing then.

Another doctor suggested that I should inhale deeply and take in lot of air into my lungs. It should remove the pain in my chest according to him. But I could not get much benefit out of deep breath.

A month before my heart operation I questioned a doctor what will happen if I continued as I was doing. He said that probably a severe attack will come all of a sudden while walking  along the road and I could fall down in the middle of a road without consciousness.

All the above interactions made me to take up a decision to go for heart operation in a dependable hospital.

Experience in the hospital:

On admission into the hospital many tests and X-rays were taken. A barber came and shaved all the hair all over my body. I wondered why they removed hair from all parts of my body leaving my hair on the head intact.

Strict instruction was given to me 12 hours before starting of operation that I should not drink water. With great difficulty I slept without taking any water.

On the day of operation at about 8 AM a stretcher was brought inside the room. They asked me to lie down on the stretcher. Then the telephone rang up. I told medical attendants that they may inject while I attend the phone call.

They laughed at me and told that I will not be conscious once the injection was made. I attended to the phone call from my son in Singapore. Then I climbet on to the stretcher and offered myself for a prick.

I lost consciousness immediately and I was taken to the operation theater. I was told that the operation took almost 6 hours. I was unconscious when my wife came to ICU to see me.

Nearly after 12 hours I felt somebody tapping my foot. I woke up as if from a deep slumber. It was the doctor who operated on my heart. I felt as if I was in a big dark room. He told me that they have removed me from artificial heart machine. I was breathing normally.

I was in ICU for next three days. Slowly I was able to recognize the environment.

I could see some device in my right hand permanently attached for passing medicine and other food materials.

I felt like passing urine and called an attendant to help me. I was told that a tube is already inserted in my body to remove the urine continuously.

I felt something strange on the side of my left leg. When I touched I could find a bandage below my knee wrapped down to foot. Later I understood that the doctors had removed a blood vessel from my leg for stitching as a bypass tubes

to my heart.

When the bandage was removed I could see the stitching by stapler pins. I was astonished how they have fixed so many stapler pins on my leg.

All along I was under the impression that the two by pass tubes made out of blood vessel were embedded into the heart. Later only I came to know that the bypass tubes were joined to the heart artilleries externally only.

For taking X-RAY I was bodily lifted by two persons. It was a strange experience for me. All the time oxygen mask was placed on my nose. I had no difficulty in breathing.

They never gave me water to drink I felt very thirsty all the three days in ICU.

Third day I was asked to get down from bed. I felt very shy to stand upright. I was asked to sit in a wheel chair and then moved to my room back. Provision of oxygen mask was there but I never used it.

I was put on diet for the next three days. They gave me insulin injection three times a day. A nurse gave me a sponge bath wiping all over my body since I was in ICU for three days continuously.

A day after the operation I was asked to walk in the veranda of the hospital as an exercise for my body. I was asked to climb the staircase to prove that my heart has become very strong after the bypass surgery.

After a week from the date of operation I was discharged. It was a journey of 100 km in a van. I had no problem in the journey.