hi @predictable ,I am so sorry reading your experience with a TIA, I know, how you felt the first days, as long as you did not know, if a serious stroke would happen. (husband had a TIA 2012) .you and my husband were lucky ,
referring to your questions about the "watchman", ( in memory of my cardiac problems: : A-fib's , mitralvalve insufficiency, minimal invasive mitralvalve reconstruction/repair April 2016)
I asked my cardiologist last november, if the implantation of this device would be useful. for me, so I could stop the bloodthinner (Eliquis).
he denied, no advantage for me , as I had to take aspirin lifelong instead of a bloodthinner. that does not make sense, he said. he showed me a paper about the risks of aspirin.
I know according to the guidelines of the european cardiology society, that after the implanation of the watchman, the person needs a 6-months treatment with an anticoagulant. until there is enough tissue to cover the device. afterwards aspirin..for such a short period they prescribe one of the new anticoagulanties, no monitoring necessary, patients do not need instructions/lessons (warfarin)
.In this context an interesting observation: in the years before april 2016 (operation) .I had paroxysmal A-Fib's. the cardiac surgeon did not an ablation at the end of the operation, as there were some problems and he did not want to extend, too dangerous, he said. until january this year I had no A-Fib's anymore. unfortunatedly,(january this year) there was a disconnection between the atriums and the ventrikels. so I had to go into the hospital and they implanted a two chamber pacemaker. immediatedly I had a lot of A-Fib's (AT/AF burden too high)..they are asymptomatic. Last september I visited a meeting in cologne/germany (main themes were A-Fib's and the new guidelines) I learned that 30-40 % of the pacemaker recipients have A-Fib's, even the persons with no history of them.
so long as these A-Fib' are asymptomatic, no treatment necessary.
I must confess, that the presence of so many A-Fib's daily scares me a bit, how can my heart cope with them???
yoanne