Upper Nazareth man receives heart procedure in 'nick of time'

FROM THE EXPRESS TIMES

Dennis Flamisch Jr. wants others to know the risks of ignoring their doctors' advice: His refusal to make lifestyle changes nearly killed him, he said.

Flamisch last month became the first patient at St. Luke’s Hospital-Anderson Campus in Bethlehem Township, Pa., to undergo a cardiac catheterization procedure that opened an artery that was 99 percent blocked. The 42-year-old Upper Nazareth Township father of two said he underwent the procedure in the “nick of time.”

“It was fast and furious, I call it,” Flamisch said about the blockage. “I want to tell people not to hesitate if they feel something wrong, because I was very lucky.”

Dr. Raymond A. Durkin, chief of cardiology at St. Luke’s Hospital & Health Network, said heart disease remains the leading cause of death among men and women in the U.S. He said typical symptoms begin with chest pain, but many have different and more subtle symptoms.

In Flamisch's case, the idea was keep the artery open with a stent, and to quit smoking and control his cholesterol, diabetes and hypertension.

"If someone has symptoms, even mild ones like shortness of breath, jaw pain or a feeling of pressure at the chest or back, it's best to get checked out and find out nothing's wrong than sit there with heart problems and not confront it," Durkin said. "I think that's the bottom line here."

Flamisch, who works as a blaster for the Austin Powder Co., admits to smoking since he was 15 years old. Junk food has been his snack of choice. And getting on an exercise regimen to lose weight had been put on the back burner, he said.

Flamisch’s wife, Teresa, urged her husband in 2010 to undergo a stress test because his father suffered a heart attack and his grandfather, whom he never met, died from a heart attack at age 49. Doctors placed a stent in Flamisch's heart following the stress test and encouraged him to maintain a healthier lifestyle.

But Flamisch didn’t heed the warnings.

“A week after, I continued to smoke two packs a day and eat what I want,” he said. “It took 40 years to get this blocked. I thought I would be fine because of the stent; I was good to go. But that wasn’t the case and that wasn’t the way to go.”
The worst came in early January as Flamisch pushed a snowblower to clear the driveway. He experienced what he described as a heaviness in his chest, which he told himself was heartburn. But later that evening, during a poker game at a 40th birthday party, Flamisch still didn’t feel right.

“I felt worn out, tired,” he recalled. "The chest pain hit me pretty hard. It was more intense than I ever felt. I felt like I was going to lose my legs because I was so shaky.”

For Teresa, it was the scariest episode she has ever seen her husband experience, a scene that brought her to tears.


“He was pale. He looked like he saw a ghost," she said. "There were bags under his eyes. He just looked off.”

Shortly after being rushed to St. Luke’s Bethlehem Township campus, Durkin told Flamisch he had suffered a mild heart attack and needed to undergo the cardiac catheterization procedure to open up his coronary arteries and to have another stent placed in the blocked vessel.

When placed into the coronary artery, the stent, a meshlike device made of metal, acts as a support or scaffold, keeping the vessel open to help improve blood flow to the heart, Durkin said.

During the roughly hour-long procedure, Durkin found blockage below the stent and that the original stent had been reblocked about 35 percent. Flamisch was awake during the procedure and was able to see on a monitor what the artery looked like before and after the procedure.

“I saw the blockage and that was life changing for me,” Flamisch said. “I can’t have something control my life and kill me.”

Flamisch, who includes among his goals getting down to a 36-inch waist, has since quit smoking cold turkey, and his family soon will be seeing a dietitian.

http://www.lehighvalleylive.com/nazareth/index.ssf/2012/02/upper_nazareth_man_receives_he.html