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Aortic Aneurysms – Introduce yourself & meet others
Aortic Aneurysms | Last Active: 5 hours ago | Replies (929)Comment receiving replies
Agreed with all the above. I dissected 11 years ago after a flight to San Diego from Minneapolis. I would be very cautious about traveling by Air. You should work diligently to reduce your blood pressure and flying for any reason will increase it. I am convinced that a big factor in my ultimate dissection was business travel. It is stressful. That said, you are in the right place and feel free to post any questions you have. I had five kids and was 50 years old when I dissected. You have the benefit of knowing you have a problem and you can proactively treat it. If it becomes an emergent dissection like mine, the survivability drops through the floor. You’re going to be OK. Listen to your doctors and keep your blood pressure down. I would talk to them immediately about the appropriateness of Travel. I know that’s hard to hear because you may have to travel for work, but your life is far more important than your work. You owe to your family and to yourself. Let us know how we can help. Peace.
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@moonboy thank you. I am sorry to hear that you experienced a dissection and appreciate your direct comments regarding air travel. It is high on the list of topics to discuss with a surgeon once I get my appointment scheduled. I was really nervous flying out. Still have to fly home. The diagnosis came 3 days prior to a previously scheduled business trip and things happened quickly and as everyone I’m sure experienced in the early days of their diagnosis I was just trying to make sense of what I was just told and the implications of it. Thankfully as it relates to air travel, while it happens, it’s not a weekly part of my job and I should be able to manage around that.
Blood pressure has historically been pretty good. I will be sure to check it daily now to stay on top of it. I have no clue what it does while traveling though. I was keeping my eye on my heart rate while flying with my Apple Watch but maybe a heart rate that is low and in control doesn’t directly correlate to BP…I don’t know.
I appreciate the encouragement as well that I found out early. It does afford me a lot of advantages that you did not get the benefit of. The prospect of open heart surgery was overwhelming at first - still isn’t easy to wrap my head around - but over the past week I’m slowly getting more comfortable with that. I think the most challenging thing right now is trying to keep my mind off of dissection. I know the risk is low right now but that does rattle me at times. @houston13 I think you spoke to wanting to get the ticking time bomb out of your chest in another post. I’ve actually quoted you to my wife as we work through processing everything.
I’ll stop for now but thank you again for your comments. I’ll be around and reading more and will post as questions come up.