{"id":3381,"date":"2023-07-11T19:51:09","date_gmt":"2023-07-11T19:51:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/?page_id=3381"},"modified":"2026-05-20T22:50:39","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T22:50:39","slug":"anxiety-fear-gillinov","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/anxiety-fear-gillinov\/","title":{"rendered":"Surgeon Insights: Top 3 Facts to Dispel Patient Anxiety Before Heart Surgery"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>One of the most common emotions that patients, their family members and friends experience specific to heart surgery is anxiety.\u00a0 I can&#8217;t tell you how many phone calls I have with patients who are in tears and\/or not sleeping due to anxiety and fear.\u00a0 Just yesterday, I spoke with Lynn who was sobbing as she openly shared with me, &#8220;I&#8217;m just so scared about what might go wrong.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>For this reason, I connected with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/surgeons\/dr-Marc-Gillinov-Cleveland-Ohio.php\">Dr. Marc Gillinov<\/a>, the Chairman of the Department of Cardiothoracic Surgery at the Cleveland Clinic.\u00a0 So you know, Dr. Gillinov has performed over 7,000 cardiac surgeries and successfully treated over 100 patients in our community.\u00a0 In this video, Dr. Gillinov explains exactly how he helps his patients manage their anxiety prior to surgery.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/4Mm6u7H0jBY?rel=0\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2>Key Learnings About Patient Anxiety &amp; Heart Surgery<\/h2>\n<p>Here are important insights shared by Dr. Gillinov specific to anxiety, fear and heart surgery:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Fact 1:<\/strong> Heart surgery is a routine procedure.\u00a0 &#8220;There are certain days in a person\u2019s life that he or she will remember forever,&#8221; states Dr. Gillinov.\u00a0 &#8220;The day you have heart surgery is on that list. It\u2019s a big, big deal and we recognize that. But, you can recognize this is what we do. This is routine for us. At <a href=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/hospital\/cleveland-clinic-microsite\">Cleveland Clinic<\/a>, for example, every day we do heart surgery on more than 20 people, coming up on 5,000 people a year. It\u2019s important for you to know we do this all the time.&#8221;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><picture><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/profileImages\/167_129_172.jpg\" alt=\"Dr. Marc Gillinov - Robotic Mitral Valve Repair Surgeon\" width=\"129\" height=\"172\" \/><\/picture><a href=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/surgeons\/dr-Marc-Gillinov-Cleveland-Ohio.php\">Dr. Marc Gillinov, Chairman of the Department of<br \/>\nCardiothoracic Surgery at Cleveland Clinic<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Fact 2:<\/strong> Heart surgery requires a team of experts. &#8220;You are not depending on one person,&#8221; states Dr. Gillinov.\u00a0 &#8220;You\u2019re depending on about 20 different people or more who are going to take care of you. That is a first-class team. We have to win the World Series every year, and we do that on your behalf.&#8221;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-3382 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/..\/Images\/cleveland-clinic-heart-surgery-mortality-rates-in-hospital.jpg\" alt=\"Cleveland Clinic In-Hospital Mortality for Heart Surgery Outcomes\" width=\"650\" height=\"404\" \/><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Fact 3:<\/strong> Heart surgery is safe. &#8220;The third thing to know is that you\u2019re going to be fine,&#8221; states Dr. Gillinov. &#8220;Nearly everyone who has heart surgery returns to a completely normal full life.&#8221;\u00a0 As you can see in the chart above, the in-hospital mortality rate for many cardiac procedures at the Cleveland Clinic is well below 1 percent.\u00a0 In fact, the in-hospital mortality rate at Cleveland Clinic for mitral valve repair surgery was 0 percent in the most recent <a href=\"https:\/\/my.clevelandclinic.org\/departments\/patient-experience\/depts\/quality-patient-safety\/treatment-outcomes\/913-outcomes-summary\">&#8220;Heart Surgery Outcomes Report&#8221;<\/a> from the Cleveland Clinic.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2>Thanks Dr. Gillinov &amp; Cleveland Clinic!<\/h2>\n<p>On behalf of our patient community, many thanks to Dr. Gillinov for sharing his clinical experience and research about fear and heart surgery with our community!\u00a0 Also, many thanks to Cleveland Clinic for taking such great care of heart valve patients.<\/p>\n<p>Related Links:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/2023\/06\/04\/dr-marc-gillinov-100-patient-reviews\/\">100 Heart Surgery Patients Celebrate Dr. Marc Gillinov!<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/robot-mitral-valve-repair-surgery\/\">Surgeon Q&amp;A: Robotic Mitral Valve Repair Surgery with Dr. Gillinov<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Keep on tickin!<br \/>\nAdam<\/p>\n<p>P.S. For the deaf and hard of hearing members of our community, I have provided a written transcript of this interview below.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"cms.php","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"class_list":["post-3381","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry","category-before-surgery"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3381","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3381"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3381\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6686,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3381\/revisions\/6686"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3381"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3381"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}