A patient’s routine pre-operative assessment quickly turned into a life-saving cardiology operation to insert a pacemaker, thanks to the quick-thinking and diligence of a UHDB nurse.
Steve Paxton had recently been on holiday, on a ‘road trip’ through France and Spain, and came back to the UK only four days prior to a pre-operative assessment for a routine hernia operation.
During the assessment, Nurse Janet Gray noticed ‘unusual’ readings on an ECG machine, which records the rhythm, rate and electrical activity of a patient’s heart – where Steve’s heart rate was reading as 21 beats per minute.
However, Janet suspected the extremely low readings were not a technical fault, and were in fact, accurate. She rushed Steve to Coronary Care in A&E – where her concerns were found to be correct, with the diagnosis of third-degree heart blockage, and an operation to insert a pacemaker required immediately.
“I felt a bit ill, but nothing alarming”, Steve said, “it was just a normal day, and a normal appointment before a routine operation.