Lawrence's Posts

well, I'm sitting here, and its been 10 months since my son passed away @31 yrs old. its has been extremely difficult. I wish I had taken him to Cleveland clinic instead of dr Steven bolling @ u of m. I just don't believe he made a good repair. he claims that a chord broke again, but that not what showed up on the tee exam. what showed up was a leaflet that was stuck stationary and one that moved back and forth. thats where it continued to leak. not a broken chorde as he said. my point here is. I don't recommend dr Steven bolling. he's a nice enough guy and all, so if your heading in that direction, I recommend otherwise for mitral valve repair based on our experience.

Hello everyone, I'm lawrence Lowe, I haven't posted for quite some time. And unfortunately, I'm posting now because my son has passed away. I'm angry, I'm sad, I'm hurt. And I'll never see him again. My son had surgery on 12-19-2014. I was told that the surgery was good and that there was no leaking. So we left and came home on 12-23-2014. At some point, I think a year later. Test showed that there was a moderate leak. The surgeon stated that my son must have broken another chord. The cardiologist that performed the tee echo recommended not going back to surgery just yet. The cardiologist was very disappointed to see such a leak after a repair just a year ago. Needless to say I was very upset about this. The surgeon did have us come back for check ups, so we went back in 2016 Thur 1/18 at intervals of 6 months and would have returned this year sometime in December or January 2019 But didn't get the chance. He passed 11-24-2018. Now, I'm not blaming anyone, because he was born with mvp. Blame can go back a long way to many people including me. However, No one even mentioned surgery to us. At 27 years old a doctor named micheal Feldman from the Beaumont medical system said we would need surgery. (Thank you). And we went in for surgery as soon as we knew he needed it. Unfortunately , his repair fail, but it also should have been performed many many many years ago. So here's what I really want to share with you all. 1. If you go in for a repair or whatever. Don't take anyone's word for how successful the operation was. Have a tee echo performed as soon as you can after surgery so you know Exactly how good your repair was. Even if you have to go somewhere else. We weren't shown anything. Only told........ 2. If you still have a leak, especially a moderate one. Watching it annually is a bad idea. It didn't work for us. Check yourself more often than that. I wish we did. We may have had another chance. (I do realize we're all different) but I still recommend more frequent check ups. And remember, its the leak that made you need the first surgery, and your heart will still be straining to keep up. 3. Everything means something, if you feel something CHECK IT OUT. DONT BRUSH OFF ANYTHING. The surgeon did advise this as well. 4. DONT SMOKE , DRINK OR DO DRUGS. alcohol is a toxin that over time produces heart failure.....the cardiologist told us this. So to that I say, you don't need a drink to have fun............