Well OT: Heart surgery - what would you do?

Some people have pacemakers to assist a heartrate which can drop too low; some have them to completely replace the signals normally passed from the upper chamber to the lower chamber via the AV node (used for those with otherwise uncontrolled atrial fibrillation); and some people have a combination pacemaker/ICD (implantable cardiac defibrillator), which functions as a normal pacemaker, but can deliver a shock if it detects ventricular fibrillation.

Reply to
S Viemeister
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That wasn't the conclusion they had reached every three years for the previous half century. Previously they had concluded that individual vaccinations cost ten times as much as mass vaccinations but they would still need to vaccinate about 10% of the number that went through mass vaccination; i.e. there was no cost advantage or disadvantage to either.

Again, an argument that was regularly reviewed every three years. The time to make that decision was when the incidence of TB was still falling, not when it was set to rise again.

I had it on very good authority from somebody at the DoH that the decision was entirely political. I know why but, as I don't have any documentary proof, I'm not going to go into any detail on a public forum.

Reply to
Nightjar

I wonder what happens when the herd immunity is gone?

Reply to
Tim Watts

I thought that, at least to some degree, TB was a disease of poverty (like malaria).

Reply to
newshound

Newsflash! Doesn't matter how much money you have, either will get you if you're unprepared.

Reply to
Richard

Most TB is easy to treat with cheap antibiotics.

However you have to take them for a long time after the symptoms have gone. Many don't do this with bad consequences like resistant strains of TB. We may well have to go back to vaccines if the resistant strains become common.

Reply to
dennis

...

Globally, around one person in three is carrying the bacterium, mostly kept dormant by the immune system. When the immune system is weakened, for any reason, then it can become active. Poverty weakens the immune system, but so can disease.

With the history of mass TB vaccination in the UK, the number of people carrying the bacterium is quite a bit lower than the global average (1 in 5 IIRC). With the demise of mass vaccination we will slowly move towards the global average.

Reply to
Nightjar

On 05/08/2014 15:29, Dennis@home wrote: ...

I'm not entirely sure I would use the term easy. It needs a cocktail of drugs and they can have some quite unpleasant side effects.

Reply to
Nightjar

It could be that the starting tooth infection *might* have skewed the heart tests. (It was a throat infection that precipitated my uncle's admission to Blackpool Vic. for a triple by-pass)

As someone has pointed out your condition hasn't just happened recently, it's developed over decades along with most of the UK adult population. But once the degree of artery hardening reaches the stage you're at, it's a good idea to deal with it before you start with severe angina attacks (caused by excercise, stress, infection etc.) or obstruction causes death of (part of) the heart muscle.

When I had to wait six weeks for a gall bladder op I lost over a stone in weight. - four weeks in France and not a crumb of cheese! (and nothing with more than about 4% fats)

Good luck - I'm sure you'll be fine.

John M

Reply to
JTM

Very few of the folk round this part seem to smoke these days and it was a tobacco growing area fifteen years ago!

And they've stopped selling the rotgut draught wine in the supermarket. But still lots of drinkable plonk for 2 to 3 euro a litre.

To be fair, at this time of year in this area, the farmers are out in the fields until well after midnight (and some of them are working :-) )

John

Reply to
JTM

ection is active.

No advice to give just personal experience:

My Pa, an ad man, thought that chest pains were a normal feature of client briefings and ignored them until he was ~60. He then had a triple bypass. He will be 90 next year but is regularly thought to be in his late 70s. H is heart surgery was the best thing that could have happened to him because he has been under the NHS microscope since then.

Best wishes for a successful outcome.

Richard

Reply to
RJS

ection is active.

Further thoughts/memories Steve: this is not experimental surgery that you are facing. NHS has been doing it for very long time. Even when my dad had it done he was up and about faster than I was when I had orthodontic su rgery 4 years previously. Also he felt very psychologically vulnerable aft er the surgery which took a bit of time for the rest of us to appreciate.

Richard

Reply to
RJS

I've been told about the new draconian UK rules on taking children out of school during term time. I can see that there should be some limits, but if there's a zero-tolerance rule where does this leave health and other essential service staff who have children? All desperately wanting holidays at the same time?

A sensible rule, to me, would be that one week's absence ahould be allowed twice a year, only once per term and not in the first two weeks or in terms where there are public exams.

Reply to
Tony Bryer

snip

My personal experience

I had my heart attack right out of the blue, sat at home one evening. Fortunately I recognised the symptoms - persistent 'indigestion' discomfort (I wouldn't call it pain) and later on pain in my arm. I was worried enough to call the ambulance and was undergoing angioplasty within a couple of hours, had stents inserted and felt much much better almot immediately.

My advice, Steve, is not to do anything you're not entirely comfortable with, certainly nothing that causes you angina. Make sure you know the proper way to use your GTN spray (overdoing it caused me to pass out). If you think you may be having an attack don't hesitate to call 999.

After your operation, do go on the rehabilitation programme. This should include talks on how and why heart problems occur, medication, and changes you can make in your lifestyle to minimise the risk factors as well as exercise and perhaps counselling. It really worked for me and improved my confidence no end.

I've since reduced my working hours and tried to minimise/share the stress. I don't know how relevant / possible it is for you to do this but I'd do so if you can.

Good luck, and I hope you have a good outcome

Reply to
Chris

No different from any others with kids at school. It's why the prices of flights etc go up dramatically during school holiday time. Or down during term time if you're selling them.

More to the point would be to stagger school holidays across the country, rather more than now.

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

Which is great, unless you happen to be trying to organise an event that people might actually want to travel across the country to attend.

Reply to
Adrian

You have this mental picture that a heart attack involves pounding chest pain - but the practise nurse told me that many take the form of a "silent infarction" and the victim does not feel a thing.

I heard that as I was having my cholestorol checkup (a new initiative on the NHS at my not very ancient age).

Apparently they are trying to get a little more proactive on such matters - if nothing else, it's cheaper to do early diagnosis and offer management or preventative treatment than it is to wait until it's all really gone pear shaped.

My father had a bypass in his 80's (he had medical insurance, the NHS probably would not have bothered). He recovered well and fairly quickly. For the first few days in the ICU he was heavily sedated and was not that bothered (so I heard afterwards) by the pain and wires.

They get you unwired from the machines as soon as they can and prep you for returning home.

I would recommend to arrange to have some help at hand for the first few weeks - have someone give the bathroom a clean with bleach (infection management) and run a hoover round the house if possible and have people ready to help so you don't have to do stuff.

Then prep for some serious "me" time - get a Netflix subscription or order some books or magazines. Plan some walks.

Yes - even with something as mundane as my hernia op a couple of years back, just do what they tell you and do it whole heartedly. It will make a *lot* of difference. And if they tell you not to do something, don't. Like no lifting arms above chest height.

They told me to get off my butt and walk about all the time, even on the day of the op. It helped.

I think stress is a big part of what's going wrong with people these days. Says he after the news today that strongly implies I have 6-12 months to find a new job before my dept disappears.

Reply to
Tim Watts

Or go to the right region of France or some other country in half terms when it's easy to miss their holidays by a full week. We did that with CentreParcs in Belgium. Worked a treat - quiet, cheap and we were the only English people there (based on a glance around the car park) - so no sodding british chavs being smelly and noisy.

Reply to
Tim Watts

Sadly, you can't have it all ways.

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

Indeed. And accepting inflexibility when it comes to fitting your holidays around the six weeks school is out should be one of the things you take account of when you decide to have children.

But, no, it appears few people do - they then expect the world to change to suit them.

Reply to
Adrian

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