About Me (In My Own Words)
The story below is old, the Evalve has been recalled because it killed some guy in Italy, so it is off the table now, Currently I am looking desperately for a GREAT surgeon that can do robotic or minimal invasive surgery with little to NO complications, in a safe hospital with state of the art systems. Tall order and almost impossible to find it seems, but I am hoping somebody, someplace on this planet will be able to help me, I pray every day for an angel, I hope there is one reading this now. Love to you all..
OLD STORY BELOW, please Ignore it, this is just how I started at this group....
I am 46 years old; I have mitral valve regurgitation stage 4+.
I have be approved for the E-Valve Clip but my insurance will not pay for it because it is not FDA approved yet and is still going through testing...here is what is really horrible about this...
I have already flown to Utah and seen the surgeon that does the clip, he says I am a prime candidate and feels the clip would benefit me and actually cure my problem, it is a clip put into the mitral valve via a catheter through a vein in the groin, and there is NO:
cutting open my chest, sawing my chest bone open, taking out my heart, cutting my heart open, putting a pig valve in, then sewing my heart back together, then putting my heart back in, then, IF I am lucky when they shock my heart it starts back up again, then they staple my chest bone back together, then sew me up and I stay in the hospital for weeks healing, then, in 10 years when the pig valve wares out, they do it all over again... this is the surgery my insurance is willing to pay for:
OR... I can simply have them go up through a vein in my groin area right into my heart and put a simple clip in my leaking valve, after a couple of days I go home and take it easy until the graph grows over the clip...then...I live happily ever after with just a few checkups to make sure the clip is still there...
this seems like a NO brainer to me, SO WHY don’t I do it? because my insurance will not cover it and because the doctors will not do the surgery and simply let me pay for it myself, I have an above average income, no I am not rich, but I do OK and I have a lot to live for, but because something could go wrong during surgery, they will not let me pay for it myself...
so instead of getting something that could literally save my life, I am forced to look into a horrible surgery which I will not ever do...so my family and I are scared every day as we wait for the FDA to get off their rears and approve this clip...it has been tested for YEARS, thousands of people have this clip according to the study coordinator in Utah, yes a few have died but they were all elderly I am told, I am 42 years old with a young wife and a 6 year old child, they need me, I need this clip...is there anything this support group can do...PLEASE HELP ME... Jack
Here is a link to the evalve clip :
http://www.heart-valve-surgery.com/mitraclip-video-percutaneous-mitral-valve-repair.php
More Info About Me & My Heart
More About Me
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I am from:
Boise, Idaho