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New diagnosis of ascending aortic aneurysm and I’m terrified
Aortic Aneurysms | Last Active: 2 days ago | Replies (176)Comment receiving replies
I was diagnosed a little less than a year ago with an ascending aneurysm of 5.4cm and the doc recommended surgery. Yeah, it kind of freaked me out but the option of dropping dead due to a dissection freaked me out worse. I stayed in shape, limited heavy lifting, walked a lot and then had the surgery.
They found two aneurysms and fixed both. I felt pretty good post surgery except for the intense itching at the incision which I know means things are healing. It is now 6 months post surgery and I am back to walking, biking, hiking at altitude (12k'+) and basically doing whatever I did before the diagnosis. So don't freak out, take all this in stride, follow doctors' orders and get to the other side of this. There is plenty of life left to live and not a lot of jello in your future!
Replies to "I was diagnosed a little less than a year ago with an ascending aneurysm of 5.4cm..."
Hi Mike, your experience gives me hope. Do you mind sharing how old you are? I’m 52 and my ascending aorta is 3.9 cm while I hope mine never grows to a size that needs surgery I’m fearful that if or when it does I will be much older and harder to recover. Thank you for sharing your experience
What was the timeframe from when you were diagnosed to having surgery?
Thank you so much for posting your story and words of encouragement. I was just now reading about the surgery and all of the potential risks are mind-boggling. You seem to have such a wonderful outlook on the surgery . I’m wondering if they gave you any kind of mental preparation for the enormous task this ascending aortic aneurysm surgery. I’ve been reading about Heart lung bypass, the cutting open of the chest wall, intubation after the surgery… It all just seems overwhelming and terrifying. I would love to know what preparation you might’ve had ahead of the surgery. Congratulations on such a wonderful outcome. It was fantastic to hear you’re back to doing all of the things you could do before. This watchful waiting period is difficult for me.
@mikeneverwired hello, may I ask how you are doing now? And also how old you are? I am 53 F and was told my Ascending Aorta was dialated at 3.9 cm one year ago. Now one year later new scan says 4.2 cm. The latest scan also said that my previous measure was 4.0cm. I question where that number came from. I had a scan this January that said “no aneurysm” but did not provide a measurement. I noted that the scan I had last year and just this month were both low dose lung ct scans that are non gated. The scan I had in January was a gated ct scan without contrast. I’ve read that the gated scans vs non gated can show significant differences in measurements due to one being timed with ekg at same point in cardiac cycle and the non gated is not timed and is measured at any random point in the cycle between systole and diastole. This makes it frustrating when trying to determine if I’ve had true growth over this year or is this just considered image modality differences, artifact differences, or radiologist measurements differences. Glad to hear from others who have had the surgery and are doing well on the other side. Gives me hope. Wishing you good health!
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Thank you so much for this encouragement. We're so lucky to have found out about our aneurysms early-ish. I get lots of help and information from this group.