Tiburcia Gets a Pacemaker

Through some fantastic donations of a collaborating cardiologist and the group Kids for World Health (http://kfwhtrek.org/ - if kids can save lives with their spare change, so can you!), a previous researcher got a few pacemakers and cables to distribute to our neediest patients.  Note that all of our patients are the neediest- in the public hospital some barely have enough to cover the $8/day charge for the hospital bed and meals.

I met Tiburcia in one of the cardiology clinics at the hospital.  She had spend a year searching for a pacemaker, as she had Chagas related heart disease.  Not the common heart failure, but rather it affected her heart's conduction system (sick sinus syndrome exacerbated at night likely due to increased vagal tone, as shown on a 24 hour holter with numerous rhythm disturbances).

Tiburcia, me, daughter Alicia, and Dr. Vela
it's as if they smiled all morning until the camera came out

We set everything up with our collaborating surgeon, Dr. Vela, and I accompanied her on all the pre-op visits.  On February 22, I was gowned and watched patiently in the OR.  The generator, to make pulses for the hearts contraction, is placed just under the skin and the wires are threaded into the heart through veins. Her veins are incredibly thin (it took 6 sticks to draw our samples) so implanting the wires was difficult, possibly also due to their anatomy.   Instead of the normal 45 minutes, the surgery took 2.5 hours.  The whole time she was under only local anesthesia (general anesthesia not needed and could be fatal with her heart condition), and I cringed with every cringe she had.  Surgery is not for me.  The left side didn't work out, so they had to cut into the right side and start trying again. And much alternating between breath holding and daydreaming on my part, it was successfully placed and tested.  As basically the patient advocate, I was sent out to tell the family what post-op meds to purchase.  I walked out, fully masked and gowned, to all her children anxiously waiting.  And I told them she was fine and the surgery was successful, albeit with aforementioned complications which were resolved.  When I walked back into the OR, I was wearing a huge smile.  "I feel like a doctor".

Tiburcia is doing well post-operatively, and gave permission to share her details with others.  Thank you to all the collaborators and especially contributing kids out there- you have made 6 children quite like yourselves very happy : )