My heart attack: the operation

At the emergency room they made me undergo exam after exam. After a while they gave me a bed, but no one explained anything. Classic Belarusian style: eventually “the boss” would come to tell me something. It was late winter, we were all well dressed and the nurses collected my clothes to take them to the storerooms.

Shortly after, two doctors arrived. They explained that I had had a heart attack and that I had some closed veins. I had trouble believing it: I had always lived great, how was that possible? They told me that they had to operate immediately to solve the issue right away and to better understand the situation.

The classic question: “What do you think you will do?”
I looked at them and thought: “What kind of questions are they asking? And if I say no will they send me away?”. In Belarus it is normal: everyone is responsible for themselves, knows the risks and decides.

I replied: “Do what you have to do”.
They warned me: during the operation there could be complications. I asked: “And if you don’t operate on me?”. They replied smiling: “In that case the complications are 100%”. At that point I said: “Let’s do it”. I signed the papers.

Two nurses arrived and started to depilate my wrists and inner thigh: they would enter from there, through a vein, to reach the heart. They didn’t yet know where they would pass, so they prepared all four points.

They would put one or more stents. Shortly after the stretcher arrived: within four hours I had seen an ambulance, the emergency room, a hospital bed and the operating room.

In the operating room

They took me onto a steel bed. The curious thing was that the bed moved, not the doctors. They tied only my left arm and from there they started the procedure: they entered through the wrist.

I didn’t feel pain, but I could clearly perceive when they got close to the heart, probably when they opened the stents. Only towards the end did I feel pain: perhaps the local anesthesia had ended. They noticed, told me they were finishing and that I had to endure just a moment more.

The immediate post-operative period

In the end they blocked the vein and took me to the post-operative area, where I stayed for 4-5 days. I was naked under a sheet, no one could visit me: it was forbidden due to the risk of infections, since all the patients there had just been operated on.

Then they removed the system that kept my vein closed: it was a kind of wheel that pressed to block it, together with anticoagulants and other drugs that made the blood more fluid. After another two days in a normal room, I was finally discharged.

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⚠️ Warning
This is my personal experience. I am not a doctor. Every person can have different symptoms, treatments and times. If you have suspicious symptoms, immediately call the 118 or go to the emergency room.


What are heart stents:

A stent is like a small metallic spring mesh that is inserted into the heart’s arteries. It is used to keep them open when the blood cannot pass because the vein is closed or too narrow.

How does it work?
They enter through the wrist or groin, get close to the heart and inflate a small balloon that widens the vein. Then they leave this mesh tube inside, which stays there forever and prevents the vein from closing again.

I didn’t feel any pain during the insertion, only a strong pressure when they opened the stent. Thanks to this today my heart receives blood again.

⚠️ Warning
This is my personal account. Stents are not all the same and the decision always belongs to the doctors.