Affliction

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Affliction was Originally Posted on December 18, 2013 by

Somewhat good news and then again, not so much so.

Lately I have had some issues when I go out and try to get some work done. I suspected vog (our volcanic smog) but I also have stomach issues (reflux) which many people have, and it can also cause some of the discomfort that I am having.

I stopped by the doctor yesterday and described my symptoms and they fit pretty well into an answer. That answer was not what I was hoping it would be. The doctor gave me an EKG/ECG and believes it may be angina. Angina may or may not be pain prior to a heart attack. To do a better test they will send me to Oahu for a stress test.

An interesting side note or two are that one medicine that I am taking for high blood pressure also is one that they would give me for angina, so I am already taking a medicine they would prescribe. Also, many people know of the other drug they gave me in the interim, nitroglycerine. While used as an explosive, it is also used to treat heart issues. The doctor decided this would be a good thing to have until I get the full workup.

The stress test will tell the tale as to what the underlying problem is and whether it really is heart related. It may not be. Decades ago I had what I remember was called a pre atrial heartbeat (I think this is now called atrial premature beats. It felt strange in that I could feel an oddity in my heartbeat and that caused me some anxiety that there was something wrong. It turns out that my heartbeat at the time was not in a normal rhythm and there would be a pause between certain heartbeats and then the heart would group two beats nearer each other to catch up. It turns out that once I took the advice of the doctor to stop smoking, that problem went away. It was comforting in a way to know that many of the young men going into the service also had the same condition.

So although this current issue sound bad, I have a pretty good feeling that they may (hopefully) find some other issue instead. Other than this problem which recently started, I am in pretty good health otherwise.

So I will need to find someone to watch the dogs in case they decide to keep me longer off-island for tests and so on.