Aortic Ascending Aneurism - Share Growth Rate

No the doctors didn't mention anything regarding exercise I am thinking because they gave me a Nuclear Stress Test in December and didn't have any findings. All looked good as far as the blood flow and the Heart pictures that were taken before and after the test. I don't typically left heavy to begin with the most is 10 lbs. and my heart rate at the gym doesn't go above 110 during the stress test they got my heart rate up to 159 with out any issues.

Good glad to hear from you. Mine 3.9mm
The cardiologist wants to do a nuclear stress test. A bit scared about
the injection of radiation from the tracer. Oh welli might have gt over
my fear. I wish there was another test I could that didn't involve the
radioactive material.
Thanks for your help.

I've had a couple of stress tests through the years. Honestly the amount of radiation is minimal. If you drink a lot of water it flushes out of your system within a day. It really is the gold standard other than an actual Catheterization to see how well your arteries and heart are functioning. The size of the yours is small as is mine and as I said in other posts here the doctors are not even calling it an aneurysm they are calling it a dilation of the ascending aorta.

It’s such a hard decision as to where to have it done. I’ve had three opinions on whether to have the surgery or not one opinion was from my surgeon here in Rapid City South Dakota. The second one was from University of Colorado health in Aurora Colorado. They both said I was a ticking time bomb and needed to have this done soon. The third opinion was from the surgeon at Mayo in Rochester who I never did talk to just talk to his PA, he said to just keep watching it. My primary care doctor said get three opinions and go with the two that are the same so I am going forward with the surgery but not in Rochester. I’m waiting for a callback from the surgeon here in Rapid City and then I will decide whether to have it in Rapid City or Aurora Colorado , the benefits of having it done here in Rapid City are pulling me to go that route. Hopefully I will know in a few days and have the surgery done sometime in February. It’s pretty scary though.

Carl, I have had a c ouple of the nuclear stress tests. If you have had a regular stress test then it is about the same. Obviously the reasoning for the tracer is to get a better look at your condition. I was told to drink lots of water to flush out the tracer, no noticeable effects.

Thanks for the information

Your situation was similar to mine, I’m 5’ 6” and my ascending aortic aneurysm was 5.2 (also bicuspid valve) My surgeon recommended as soon as appropriate surgery (I had just had a leg fracture repair and they want you walking after heart surgery), I had my surgery 3 months after my leg surgery. I was in very good physical shape and my surgeon gave me a 99.9% probability of not having any complications. Surgery is painful (not as much as leg fracture though) and you feel like crap for periods of time (they manhandle you heart so everything gets inflamed and needs time to recover). I was out of the hospital in less than a week and back to work in 3. Life is back to normal, just need to get the valve checked every year, it will have to be replaced at some point. Let me know if you want more insights into the recovery

For what is worth, I had my surgery at the Houston Medical Center with Dr Anthony Estrera, he is absolutely wonderful, he and his team are very well known, couldn’t have asked for a better surgeon

I had my surgery at the Houston medical center with Dr Anthony Estrera, absolutely amazing surgeon, not only he is one of the most experienced cardiovascular surgeons in Houston but an amazing person.

Thanks so great! I love that your surgeon was so confident and gave you that 99.9 figure. Mine keep saying the surgery is more risk that not doing it right now. But, I worry constantly about both the aneurysm and the surgery. When it was smaller, at least I only worried about the aneurysm! Once you had your surgery, do you have to worry about the synthetic graft or is your worry pretty much gone? I’m thinking at 4.8 that I need to get it over with so I can focus on my life instead of this pending surgery.