I wonder if it was rheumatic fever. My father-in-law had that and it also left him with a weakened heart. He died at 48. Now we have drugs for everything. Then it was the luck of the draw. In addition, we also had to go through all the so-called childhood diseases, such as measles, chicken pox. whooping cough, etc. because there were no vaccines. Measles is a very serious disease. Now because of modern scientific discoveries kids don't have to go through all of this. So it is very important to get the proper vaccines for your children.