My second AFib episode wasn’t a real one, but it was another misdiagnosed non existing heart attack. At this time I was at new clinic again trying to (finally) do some therapy for my “Burnout”-condition that I was initially diagnosed for. At this point I was on a new medication plan since some days and felt many “heart stumblings” in my chest again, but it felt quite different to my first episode. At least I decided to go to the doctor on duty telling her my symptoms. She directly sent me to the emergency room (ER) for a closer look.
In the ER I got an ECG and a blood check. After some time a young doctor walked in and said: “Sir I have a good and a bad news! … You have a heart attack, but it is only a very small one, so don’t worry.” Me: “But I have no pain etc. why do you think that?”, She: “Your troponin values are raised.”. I asked her what the good news would be. She answered: “Based on our standard protocol you will get some medication now and then tommorow …”, Me: “Why tomorrow?” She: “…tomorrow we will do a catheter analysis of your hearts blood vessels.”. Me: “Why not an MRT?”, She: “We don’t have such possibility here and you should better stay here for monitoring.”
A short time later I got that promised medication and another blood check. The doctor was a little bit surprised that the troponin value was getting low very fast again. Some hours later in the morning it was normal again. But a catheter check was done anyway – nothing was found.
A little bit perplexed the doctors were guessing the next day about what the cause of this all might have been. At first they said to me maybe it was a “Takutsubo“, than a “heart inflammation” or probably a “fast heart rhythm disorder”. Diagnosed by dice (it seemed to me) they at least agreed to the last one. After that I did a lot of checkups at different health care Centers by my own, a high resoultion MRT, an echocardiogram, a heart stress test, blood checks, etc.. Everything looked great, no structural damage or other cause could be seen. A heart specialist told me later: “No matter what it was, known by newer science your heart will have repaired that kind of damage itself, … if there ever really was one.”
What made me sceptic after all of this was that no one ever suspected the new medication plan as a root cause of that trouble. In my eyes it needn’t to be the cause, but I as an engineer would suspect the things that have been last added to a running system first if some trouble comes up.
From this time on I started to ask more questions to my doctors and my gut feeling of getting rid of any “supportive” medication, got stronger and stronger. Since I have dropped the most of the medication in consultation with my doctors I never had measured a higher toponin value again anymore since today.
What did I learn until this point (not a medical advice):
- Doing a correct diagnosis is not always that easy.
I wouldn’t build my life up on those diagnostics anymore. Whenever possible a second or third opinion might be a good idea. Also I would ask myself more often what feels right or wrong to me before I make a decision.
(But being in the ER this is really difficult.) - A bad diagnosis or prognosis definitely doesn’t need to be right.
- The more a doctor is close to a good detective, the better it seems to me are his/her diagnostics.
- Sometimes the “obvious” is not seen or has been faded out.
(Especially experts often only see whats in their specific focus, that’s a human problem I was often faced with in my life, not only as a patient.) - Doctors are human beings, sometimes they are right sometimes they are wrong. I don’t blame them for this, but more than one time I needed to remind them (friendly) that they are talking with a none medical professional, but an (average intelligent) adult, not a kid and not an idiot (not completely).
- Standard protocols should help doctors to do their job, ensure a quality standard and let them stay save in their business, but it seems to me these protocols are often defining treatment processes and medication plans that also limit the possibilities of acting individually and senseful. (Why?)
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