Category: A Woman’s Guide to Living with Heart Disease

ISCHEMIA study: that blockage isn’t a time bomb in your chest

~ Carolyn Thomas ~ 9 Comments

by Carolyn Thomas   ♥   @HeartSisters  

If you’re a heart patient living with stable angina, the ISCHEMIA clinical trial presented at the 2019 American Heart Association Scientific Sessions is all about you. Cardiologist Dr. John Mandrola described the impact of this study in his Medscape column like this:

“CARDIOLOGY CHANGES TODAY!”      .

But realistically, does one study have the power to actually change the practice of cardiology?      .
 Continue reading “ISCHEMIA study: that blockage isn’t a time bomb in your chest” →

Summer Book Sale!

~ Carolyn Thomas ~ 3 Comments

When you ignore pain because you’re used to it…

~ Carolyn Thomas ~ 10 Comments

by Carolyn Thomas  ♥  @HeartSisters 

I can’t be completely sure, of course, but I’m betting my next squirt of nitro spray that I am a world-class stoic when it comes to putting up with pain. I survived a ruptured appendix and a near-fatal case of peritonitis that kept me hospitalized for a month as a teenager. I popped out two babies the old-fashioned, drug-free way after 20+ hours of labour and Lamaze breathing.  I suffered a broken bone in a bicycle accident while commuting downtown, but still somehow climbed back on that bike in order to show up on time for the meeting I was heading to. 

And I put up with two long weeks of increasingly unbearable symptoms (including being unable to walk more than five steps at a time) after being initially misdiagnosed in mid-heart attack with acid reflux.

So I sat up and paid attention when I happened upon the Despite Pain blog post called The Problem with Being Used to Pain or Illness.  
Continue reading “When you ignore pain because you’re used to it…” →

Failure to inspire

~ Carolyn Thomas ~ 34 Comments

by Carolyn Thomas  ♥  @HeartSisters 

Blogging sometimes feels like a cross between therapy (writing about what I’m obsessing over at any given moment) and planning a classroom lecture (getting emerging research, current journal references and my own thoughts in order about very specific subjects – mostly women’s heart disease and the experience of becoming a patient). 

But if you’ve been here before, you already know that one of my favourite parts of noodling away on this blog is the interactive response from my readers. This is always a two-way street. Your comments make me laugh, they make me cry, they almost always make me want to respond. My favourite kind of reader comment: “I thought I was the only one who felt this way. . . “

But what some of you may not know is that sometimes, reader comments can also make me feel tired and cranky.    Continue reading “Failure to inspire” →