"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."
--Jeremiah 29:11

Friday, July 12, 2013

Blessing in Disguise

This post refers to the pacemaker lead issue. I'll try to keep it very simple. While I have a rather firm grasp on most things heart related, this is one area where I still feel very inadequate and out of my league. Electrophysiologists must be about the smartest people on earth.

We suspected Connie had a damaged atrial lead following his July 1st pacemaker
transmission.  This past weekend we were at a birthday party and before anyone saw the warning sign, Connie had touched a plasma tube. They can cause electrical interference and make it so implanted devices get reset to factory settings or fail to work properly. Conway instantly received a shock down his arm (likely from his metal medic alert bracelet). He cried and was pretty shaken up for a few minutes. We notified his doctor who told us to check his heart rate and go ahead and send another transmission. He let me know Connie was okay, but the pacer was still acting up and he was going to have a Medtronic field rep take a look. They decided that there was an issue with his settings and so yesterday we went in and had it reprogrammed. Basically Connie has been rebooted and our doctor feels confident that the trouble he was seeing was indeed this sensing issue and not a fractured lead!!! He said to go on our way and we'll recheck it in three months. We are thrilled that it seems the threat of possible O.R. time in the forseeable future is now gone! Our brilliant doctor may not have been able to make this discovery without this unfortunate incident so we feel this has been a silver lining of sorts and a blessing in disguise.

As always, thanks for keeping up with us and keeping little man in your prayers. We have an AWESOME God who is always by our side.