Heart murmur picked up by gp

Doctor noticed a heart murmer when I had an army medical when age 18,I had my aortic valve replaced when I was 77. I'll be 82 next week. Just live your life to the full. I met a lady who did not know that she had been born with an aortic valve defect and and had been a professional dancer. It was just found by chance when she had a chest infection long after retiring as a dancer.

My valve was over 75% closed when having it replaced and I did not have any noticeable symptoms.

 

Wow i just dont understand why your doc did not lisn to your concerns. And yes u prob nrw mire about the symptoms than the dic as my doctor said it looks fine to me but im no expert so i will refer you fir eco i hope your husband keeps well and gets better gid bless

Im also lucky i live in scotland where we have free medical

Fiona - We are in Australia, and also get free medical.

My husband had been in the local hospital a few days previous where they had picked up a unusual ECG reading and refered us back to our local GP. 

Still annoys me that the hospital even discharged him that day, they should have done more investigating.

GP dismissed my concerns, and would not give us referral to the local hospital, whom at that point I still trusted. 

So i elected to go private, thats where the money came into the issue, I was going to have to prove to the GP that my husband had an issue, echo diagnosed heart failure, and private specialist wanted to do angiogram the following day, we declined, thank goodness, two days later he collapsed at home, in full on congestive heart failure, admitted to local hospital, given large amount of frusemide, and monitored, following morning told we would see cardiologist, this man walked in, flicked the blankets off husbands feet, and checked his ankles and said sent him home. Nurses had a discussion with him, and Dr kept shacking his head NO.

Later nurse aproached me, and said, walk him out the front door, and drive him straight to the heart hospital across the city, they admitted him and kept him 8 days, treated him for further congestive heart failure, stablised his condition, did a mini angiogram, more echos, MRI's, never found out what caused his heart condtion, but suspected to be a virus.

I do know that the so called cardio at our local hospital was ripped up, told by nurses at the heart hospital, Dr's there were furious, kept questioning me, he was transferred here by ambulance, NO, I was the ambulance, they could not understand how he had been discharged from our local hospital. 

I really do wonder how many people have perished that could have been saved at our local hospital and local so called cardio, as you can understand we do not go back there, but travel across the city to the heart hospital for any treatment for my husband.

Has since collapsed at home a couple of more times, once he managed to get his fluid balance out of wack, and was very de-hydrated, blood pressure exptremly low, again drove him to heart hospital.

Last time was just before easter this year, he collapsed again, blood pressure normal but heart beat at 30BPM, not normal for him, he was stablised again, and finally after a couple of days of humming and harring, finally saw his senior cardiologist, who kicked juniors in the ass, again they had missed warning signs, he seems to be the type who doesn't have normal symptoms of heart failure, swollen ankles, doesn't happen, his symptoms are much more subtle, and they installed a 3 lead pacemaker and de-fib, he has never been as well as he is now in the last 5 years, the pacemaker seems to be just what he neeed. 

Same carido's senior houseman said we need you to be working here in the heart unit, when can you start, never I had to say, I don;t have any nursing qualifications, he nearly feel off the chair, and said you at least have first aid, NO, not that either.