I hope having an answer means that there's one less open question to nag at you. But it's a shitty and random answer indeed.
amych, it’s what we all suspected. The kicker is the randomness. It just sucks that it was something that was supposed to fix him, but there’s going to be structural defects after you cut into something to repair it. I just wished we would have known the increased risk, because perhaps it could have been monitored. The overwhelming majority of cases like this don’t present with prior symptoms/arrhythmias It’s one and done.
wow. well at least you have some closure there. it probably doesn't make you feel any better though.
took long enough, but I suppose that's about right time wise.
le n, the closure is good. You’re right, and it definitely doesn’t bring him back. It took about 2 months. Hopkins requested a more detailed autopsy to discern the cause of death. His oncologist was really concerned that an otherwise healthy 40 year old up and died. His major organs went to specialized pathologists and it took time to synthesize all the data. There were also ramifications for the clinical trial. The trial was suspended and Rob’s death was reported to the FDA and the IRB, just in case it was the vaccine. They were allowed to continue the trial with the existing participants after 2 weeks, but they just now received permission to enroll new participants. I’m glad, because I think this melanoma vaccine has promise.
I still owe you an accounting of who knitted/crocheted your blanket! Let me check on something and I'll see if I can post it.
That would be wonderful! I want to thank you all properly. It’s truly lovely and makes me feel so very much loved every time I look at it.
That's scary. I have an intraventricular septal defect. Never needed surgery, but still.
It is scary, and we were a little clueless. I think it’s because Rob didn’t want to alarm anyone, but he took a lot of unnecessary chances over the years. I’m mad at him for that, but who knows if it would have changed anything? The official COD is complex congenital heart disease status post-surgical repair. It’s the repair that raises the risk.
My nephew has had two open heart surgeries because of a birth defect. He's doing fine now, but I worry about him all the time.
sj, as your nephew grows, make sure his parents understand they need to find a cardiologist who specializes in congenital heart defects. This is really important when he reaches adulthood, because that’s when you think the risk has diminished.
It somehow seems really unfair to go through the fear and trauma of cancer and then die unexpectedly of a heart defect.
This. A thousand times, this. We worried about his heart, because of his weight and eating habits, but we never even thought about sudden cardiac death. Ironically, his BP was low-normal, his cholesterol was good, and his sugar was low. He was healthy.
I’m still not convinced that sleep apnea didn’t play a part.
Thank you for the thoughts and good wishes. I ended up crying during yoga yesterday—confluence of results and emotions and music and words spoken by the person who led the class. Kind of embarrassing.