Issue link: https://newsleader.uberflip.com/i/97647
Sarasota News Leader December 7, 2012 said they were not equipped to deal with my condition. They suggested I go to a second hospital, and Kay strongly recommended the Hamot Medical Center in Erie, PA, which I later learned was one of the top 50 hospitals in the U.S. By this time, Kay had been with me for 2½ hours and I insisted she go home for dinner; I told her I would be fine. Reluctantly, she left, and a second ambulance took me to Hamot. Page 72 Kay kindly offered to pack my things and ship them to Sarasota, and Petrella said he would perform a catheterization on me on Aug. 1. On Monday morning, I awoke with strong feelings of guilt. I had felt absolutely fine since the oxygen mask had been placed on my face in the first ambulance. I had Kay packing and shipping my things, I had others set to handle my commitments at home and I was about to have a catheterization — all for nothing. I I arrived there at 6:30 p.m. and at 8:30 p.m. shared my thoughts with Petrella, who paid Dr. Richard Petrella, a world-class cardiolo- no attention to me. gist, was in my room. I asked him whether I After the procedure, Petrella told me the cathcould go home to Sarasota the next day as I eterization had revealed two blockages in the had planned. Petrella said I could not do that: arteries of my heart and he was glad he had I had been diagnosed with acute coronary synalso done an ultrasound, which showed two drome, but I had not had a heart attack. more blockages where he had not expected However, the next morning when he came to them. He had implanted four stents in three my room again, Petrella said that if I wanted arteries of my heart that were 75 percent to to, I could return to Sarasota that day. I do not 85 percent blocked. know what changed his mind; perhaps he had Petrella put me on daily doses of a blood thinseen some positive test results. He went on ner, which he said he wanted me to stay on to say that I could also stay and he would run for the rest of my life (as it keeps the stents some tests on me beginning Monday, Aug. 1. open), as well as a statin (to keep my cholesThe choice was up to me. terol level down) and on baby aspirin. I had I did not know what to do. I was 83 years already been on blood pressure medication old; my clothes, computer and everything I for several years. had packed for a week's stay in Chautauqua (Subsequently, I had to stop taking the statin were in Chautauqua; I was in Erie, PA, where because it caused muscle pain, as well as the I knew no one; and I had commitments back blood pressure medication. Fortunately, my home in Sarasota. blood pressure and cholesterol level stabilized I had had a cardiologist in Sarasota since I had without them.) been diagnosed with a mild heart murmur, so Ordinarily, I would have been able to go home I telephoned her. the next day, but I had a reaction to the anesShe said, "Sonia, you look decades younger thesia. Because of that and the difficulties of than you are, and I've been treating you that making travel arrangements from my hospital way. I haven't given you lots of tests. Stay at bed, I was not able to leave until two days Hamot and have the tests." later.