# Anyone recovered from a SCAD heart attack ( Probabably female) and did they ever reach full fitness again?



## HarryTheDog (22 Jun 2020)

Sorry this is going to be a bit of a story.
Me and my partner used to keep fit by me cycling and us both Ballroom dancing 4-6 hours per week.
When lock down happened no dancing. So my partner decided she wanted to get cycling fit and actually race in CX in sept. She has super low blood pressure, never smoked, hardly drinks and could knock out a jive without being breathless so a fit lady. 
Se she embarked on a structured training plan starting off sensibly slow with just some local rides at a slowish pace building over a month to turbo training. A proper beginners plan over 12 weeks. She made big improvements and could get up a lot of steep hills etc. After about 6 weeks of the turbo plan this last weekend we were shopping and she said take me home I feel ill. On the drive home ( just a mile) she described heart attack symptoms but could not believe it was. ( pain in left arm and across her shoulders)
When we got home rung 111 and they sent a ambulance ( we live just over a mile from the hospital) . ECG showed a problem so off to hospital she went.
Turns out she had a very unusual type of heart attack called a SCAD spontaneous coronary artery dissection (*SCAD*), a tear forms in an artery in the *heart*. This can cause blood to pool in the area between the layers. Blood trapped between the layers can form a blood clot (hematoma). *SCAD* can reduce or block blood flow through the artery, 
Now these forms of heart attack have only become apparent in recent years as angiograms have got better. There are nearly exclusive to ladies that have recently given birth or mostly found in women that have recently gone through the menopause . Usually in perfectly fit women. Her tear was in the left anterior atery ( soemtimes know as the widow maker) . The causes are unknown and are part of research. The angiogram showed no furring of the arteries at all and her blood pressure is stupidly low ( around the 95/55 odd usually had it all her life) and resting heart rate low 50's, lowish cholsetrol.

The treatment can be the usual stent , cardiac bypass or meds and self heal. She is on the self heal route.
Now at first we thought oh hell the cause was suddenly taking up cycling and turbo in her mid 50's but we were assured that unless she had run a marathon the training had not caused it and it was "bad luck" does not stop me feeling guilty as sin though, thinking oh shoot I nearly killed the missus by suggesting turbo.
We have done the usual internet search but its rare and find no stories of women going back to climbing mountains, doing marathons etc. 
So anybody know of anyone. She asked the doctor at the cardiac unit but he was evasive and said her case had to go to a meeting and she might have to go back for a full body scan as research is ongoing and they might want her to be part of it.

So anybody had one or know someone who has had one and what their recovery was like?
She is not too bothered about not being able to cycle in a CX race etc but she would like to dance the night away again , plus we wanted to do some hiking holidays etc.
Thanks if you have read thus far.


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## BrumJim (22 Jun 2020)

Interesting that she has very low blood pressure. Does she have any other medical issues?


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## HarryTheDog (22 Jun 2020)

No none at all, strangely she had similar symptoms 10 years ago went in as a suspect heart attack and they found nothing at all wrong but kept her in for 10 days.( waiting for a angiogram, this time around she was straight into a cardiac unit and low numbers of patients due to COVID so 1 day wait) Her and their reasoning last time was she had just witnessed a violent attack in a subway so could have been a form of panic attack. This time they think all SCAD cases are to do with hormone changes but research is ongoing as they still cant find a link with all the other women as well.
Many times over the years she has mentioned her low blood pressure which hardly went up even when she was pregnant many years ago but doctors have never been interested and just said excellent, low risk of heart attack for you ! how wrong they were. We also questioned why this time they are giving her Ramapril which lowers blood pressure and we recorded 89/48 last night. This morning as he is onto the doctor about it ( via phone) The resoning is Ramapril also relaxes the arteries helping in their repair.
The only thing worthy of mention she is tiny at 4ft 10 and our online research shows us ladies with Marfans syndrome are more susceptible to SCAD but people with Marfans are usually tall and thin.


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## BrumJim (22 Jun 2020)

Thanks. My wife has particularly low blood pressure, and had a problem recently also linked to historic symptoms of a panic attack, which resulted in an ambulance coming out and giving her an ECG. No sign of a heart attack in that case. She is of a similar age, I guess.

However she has hypermobility syndrome, and although not showing Marfans syndrome, a lot of hypermobile people do. Marfans is more about proportion, I believe, with proportionally long arms and fingers.

HMS symptoms include joint pain and dislocations / subluxing. Also low blood pressure as the arteries stretch a bit too much.


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## HarryTheDog (22 Jun 2020)

Hmm interesting, I showed your post to her and one of the things they asked my missus to do in the hospital was bend her hands forwards and backwards which she thought a bit weird. She showed me and she can get her hands at a complete 90 degrees to her arms both in the forward and back position. She thought nothing of it apart from strange and they did not explain why. I tried it and can get nowhere near her angles maybe she is a bit more flexible than normal?. I would not worry that your missus is going to have a SCAD though as it is very unusual.


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## HarryTheDog (22 Jun 2020)

Just a quick question @BrumJim when she had the symptoms of a heart attack but was a panic attack did they blood test her troponin levels. The false attack my partner had 10yrs ago, she had high levels of it which showed the heart in distress which indicate a possible attack.


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## Slick (22 Jun 2020)

HarryTheDog said:


> Just a quick question @BrumJim when she had the symptoms of a heart attack but was a panic attack did they blood test her troponin levels. The false attack my partner had 10yrs ago, she had high levels of it which showed the heart in distress which indicate a possible attack.


That maybe answers a question I had as to why did they keep her in for 10 days for a suspected heart attack? That suggests they thought something was going on.


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