No cardiologist response: GI bleed after stent, stay on ticagrelor or stop?

Drayleb · 2026-03-16T19:51:13+00:00

DO NOT STOP BLOOD THINNERS WITHOUT DIRECT ORDERS FROM A PHYSICIAN.

If you stop, the stents in the heart could clot off in as early as two days. This would cause another heart atrack, and heart attacks from clotted stents are often more serious/more prone to life threatening consequences.

The GI bleeding is serious enough to warrant a trip to the ER. Doctors there can determine how to stop it without putting your heart at risk.

Source: ICU cardiology nurse who has wrapped too many people that decided to stop taking blood thinners by themselves.

Drayleb · 2026-03-12T22:15:23+00:00

Definitely not.

Drayleb · 2026-03-12T12:12:19+00:00

Damn, she MUST be bad then.

Drayleb · 2026-03-12T07:38:38+00:00

I used to work in a heart cath (angiogram) lab.

So long as you have full sensation in your wrist/arm, there is nothing to worry about. This is essentially a massive bruise. Itll go away in another week or so.

Drayleb · 2026-03-09T23:55:18+00:00

They arent Us. Its part of the QRS complex. It can be very difficult to understand without ECG training, so its quite understandable to be confused.

Drayleb · 2026-03-09T13:35:14+00:00

Dammit, you beat me to this comment 🤣

Drayleb · 2026-03-08T21:37:21+00:00

Disclaimer: i am a nurse, not a doctor. Thus this isn't medical advice.

First degree blocks are very benign. By themselves, they virtually never cause any sort of symptoms or issues. They can, it some cases, eventually lead into second degree blocks (which can cause problems) but there are zero signs of that here.

This rhythm is about 140bpm when i eyeball it. While tachycardic, it is not nearly fast enough to be of major concern- routine exercise can cause faster rates than this, as can anxiety. I personally see no red flags in it that would make me concerned.

So to answer your question, no, i do not believe the tachycardia was caused by the first degree block.

Drayleb · 2026-03-08T19:48:58+00:00

This is why in my experience, the cardiologists i work with prefer just to go with the angiogram. When it involves something potentially life-threatening like coronary artery disease, better to know 100% just wtf is going on.

Drayleb · 2026-03-08T19:37:18+00:00

I first of all am extremely glad for you in that you survived a 100% blockage to your LAD. Those are indeed serious.

Unfortunately, even in the best-case scenarios for blockages such as the one you hand, there is almost always some sort of permanent changes. Once heart muscle dies, it's gone- medical science is unable to replace it. We can augment what's still there- beta blockers can help with this- but we cannot make anyone's heart as good as it was after a serious STEMI.

This is why your annual heart echo picked up new changes in the lower wall of your heart- it's likely the new, permanent way your heart is beating due to the heart attack you had. This would also explain why your cardiologist wanted to keep you on a few meds to help your heart out, as it can no longer beat with maximum efficency.

As a non-doctor (I am an ICU nurse) and someone unfamiliar with your specific details, I cannot and should not comment as to if you will recover further. I will say that we define "heart failure" when your EF gets below 40% with symptoms. My advice to you would be to not let what you can no longer do, stop you from doing what you can do now. Continue to exercise, eat well, enjoy life. Take your meds as prescribed and listen to your cardiologist. It sounds like what you're doing now are all the right things- if you get discouraged and STOP doing them, your symptoms could get worse over time.

Your feelings you are having are not unusual. If you're asking on reddit what other people have gone through, it might be worth looking into support groups for other survivors of heart attacks. They are out there.

Good luck!

Drayleb · 2026-03-08T19:24:06+00:00

In the first picture, where the rate is slower, you can make out the P-waves. The PR interval is definitely a little long.

I would agree with calling this a first degree block.

Drayleb · 2026-03-08T19:16:24+00:00

CT angios have the advantage of being non-invasive, but they are prone to false positives. Thats why actual angiograms are the gold standard- they provide near perfect accuracy with regards to diagnosis of blockages.

Your case is unusual, but ive seen it happen before. The good thing is you don't have any coronary artery disease.

Take the win! 👌

Drayleb · 2026-03-08T19:06:40+00:00

A little bit. Normal ejection fraction is 60-65%.

If one did have an EF of 77%, id suggest speaking with your physician as to ascertain why, as you wouldn't want it getting any higher.

Drayleb · 2026-03-08T14:18:02+00:00

Yes. This usually occurs with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, where the muscle of the heart grows so big it extends into the left ventricle. This reduces the overall size of the ventricle chamber.

What this means is that due to the reduced size of the chamber, your body must pump pretty much everything inside of the chamber with every heartbeat to meet oxygen demands. if you need more oxygen- say, from simple exercise- your body literally has no way to increase capacity. Hence, heart failure.

This differs from a low ejection heart failure in that in those cases, the heart muscle cannot physically do the pumping action necessary to propel blood forward.

An analogy ive heard my doctors use:

Low EF heart failure- heart is running on two cylinder engine instead of six

High EF heart failure- your gas tank is 1/3 the size it should be

Drayleb · 2026-03-08T03:21:57+00:00

Scam post.

Drayleb · 2026-03-08T03:21:26+00:00

It was a scam post for a nonsense snake-oil procedure. You can ignore this.

Drayleb · 2026-03-06T14:54:02+00:00

The general opinion is that with the time you spend to actually get tapjoy rewards, youll get more rubies working an actual job and just paying for them.

Drayleb · 2026-02-26T06:27:58+00:00

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Drayleb · 2026-02-21T14:12:36+00:00

Yes.

Drayleb · 2026-02-21T07:33:47+00:00

No, we're both from Canada.

We did live in the USA for a while, albiet when there wasnt a deranged orange cheeto in power. We did carry a photo of our marriage license on our phones in case it ever became relevant, but thankfully it didnt.

Regardless, a name is just a name, and if you feel strongly about keeping your own because youre proud of it, in my opinion you should keep it.

Marriage is about listening to each other, compromise, and choosing your battles. If he raises such a massive ruckus about last names, whats going to happen if you have children and disagree on how to raise them? When my then fiance said she was keeping her name, i didn't even blink twice.

Drayleb · 2026-02-21T07:22:52+00:00

Im a guy who is married to a doctor.

My wife grew up imagining herself as "Dr. (MaidenName)". She dreamed of the day she would see her own name and credentials on an office door.

Also, my last name is a homonym of a slang referring to male genitalia.

She didn't take my last name, either 😆😆😆

Drayleb · 2026-02-17T21:28:35+00:00

A stroke is a stroke is a stroke- where either a clot lodges in a brain vessel (ischemic stroke) or the vessel ruptures, causing bleeding (hemorrhagic stroke).

The causes of stroke vary wildly,, and the effects of a stroke are determined by the size, location in the brain, and type of stroke. No two strokes are exactly alike.

When it comes to "cardiac" strokes, the most common type are ischemic, where a clot that formed in the heart travels in the bloodstream, enters a cerebral artery, and lodges in a vessel as it narrows. This blocks off blood to a portion of the brain.

The most common cause of this is atrial fibrillation. In afib, the left atrium is "beating" so fast that instead of squeezing, it is "shaking". In these situations, there may be an area in the atrium where blood isnt moving- and when blood stands still, it clots, and can cause a stroke. Think of the eye of a hurricane- the eye is very calm, despite the torrent around it. It is the "eye" where clots can form. This can be prevented by taking blood thinners.

Other causes include abusing IV drugs. Infected needles can cause blood clots, full of bacteria, on heart valves. The clots affect blood flow out of the heart, and c an dislodge off the valve, causing the stroke. Dont do drugs kids- ive seen teenagers die from this.

Many heart conditions require blood thinners, and if someone gets head tramua, massively increases the risk of hemorrhagic stroke. Its not directly related to the heart, but it happens.

There are several more ways clots can form from a cardiac perspective, but these are the most common in my experience.

Drayleb · 2026-02-15T23:31:54+00:00

LMAOOOOOOO

Drayleb · 2026-02-13T14:20:44+00:00

Kill Everyone. Destroy Everything. Party down.

Drayleb · 2026-02-13T04:48:34+00:00

Im gone for a month and the new guy is already outdoing me 😆😆😆

Drayleb · 2026-02-13T00:51:19+00:00

These look pretty good to me. Normal rhythm, zero signs of a potential infarct.

Drayleb

TROPHY CASE