Survivor Series Featuring Christina Han

I was an active 65 year old, in good health with no co-morbidities. I had naturally low blood pressure all my life.

I was diagnosed with arrythmia about 12 years ago but it was random and not of concern to the cardiologist.

On August 13, 2020, on a hot summer afternoon in north county San Diego, I was working at my desk in my home office when I experienced a sudden and severe shooting pain on the right side of my jaw.

I was on the phone with my husband at that moment, and I was immediately apprehensive, knowing that it had something to do with my heart. My first thought was that it was a classic myocardial infarction and I would need to get a clogged coronary artery cleared with a stent.

I hung up abruptly, telling him I needed to lie down (which of course alarmed him since he was out of town).

The pain then moved from my jaw to a heavy pressure in the middle of my chest, and an ache in my upper back.

Intuitively I did NOT lie down, but sat on the edge of the bed. I became light headed, sweaty, nauseous and short of breath. Still thinking this was a regular heart attack. I called my neighbor to ask for a ride to the hospital. He wasn't home. I recall thinking, "if I do nothing, and just sit here, maybe I'll lose consciousness and just pass away."

And then I thought about my daughter-in-law who was 8 months pregnant with our first grandchild and realized I need to stick around.

Since we live in a rural area about 30 minutes from an ER or urgent care facility, I made the somewhat reckless decision to drive myself to the hospital instead of calling 911.

At this point it had been about a half hour from the moment of jaw pain, and the chest and back pain was lessening and then intensifying alternately so I thought I could make it to the hospital without driving off a cliff.

This was at the height of the Covid pandemic, so the protocol for ER admittance took longer than typical.

Upon evaluation, my BP was unusually low, especially the diastolic reading: 99/40. After ECG, blood work, and portable chest x-ray, the ER physician made the astute decision to order a CT scan.

Below are the findings:

There is aneurysmal dilation of the descending aorta measuring 5.5 cm in diameter. There is a type A aortic dissection originating at the proximal ascending aorta extending through the arch, into the descending thoracic aorta, the abdominal aorta, the right common iliac artery and proximal external iliac artery, in the proximal left common iliac artery. 

There is a small amount of pericardial fluid but no evidence of hemopericardium. At the level of the great vessels, partially imaged, the dissection extends into the innominate artery. At the level of the abdominal aorta, dissection seen extending into the celiac artery and superior mesenteric artery. The true lumen supplies the right renal artery, the false lumen supplies the left renal artery which demonstrates delayed contrast enhancement. The inferior mesenteric artery originates from the false lumen.

The ER leaped into action to find a team qualified and available to perform emergency surgery. They called 6 hospitals in San Diego and one in Orange County (about an hour and a half away).

Finally, a cardiothoracic surgeon at Hoag Hospital, Newport Beach agreed to take me, even after just completing a 5 hour procedure. Fortunately the aneurysm hadn't ruptured, but his words that I learned later were "if I don't take her, she will die."

Apparently I had a 3 hour window before it would be too late.

My son Nicholas was allowed to be with me, and was updating my daughter Alexis in Florida and my husband Michael who was frantically trying to get a flight home.

I was given morphine and loaded into a Life Flight helicopter for the 14 minute ride to Hoag.

My procedure lasted 7-8 hours. My dissected ascending aorta was repaired with a biosynthetic material made by Gore (as in Goretex). 

My 10 day hospital stay went fairly smooth but I suffered nerve damage to my toes and left index finger. Since the blood supply to my extremities was compromised for an extended time, my toes blistered and then turned black (necrosis).

I feared they would have to amputate but with diligent wound care and good circulation they were saved. I still have nerve pain in my toes 3 1/2 years later, not to be confused with neuropathy that diabetics often suffer from. The sensation is like chronically feeling coarse sand in between my toes with numbness, tingling and shooting pains.

It's a challenge finding footwear that doesn't make my toes scream. I don't have any feeling in my index finger, probably never will.

Although my aortic dissection/aneurysm procedure healed well, I didn't feel like myself for about 5 months. My appetite was mediocre, food didn't have much flavor, I had to take a long nap every day and my brain was foggy.

I had semi-annual CT scans for the first 2 years, and since 2023 they are scheduled annually, which is a good sign.  I am eternally grateful to the extraordinary surgeon and his team for saving my life. 

I'm just as thankful to my family for being the best caregivers I could ever ask for.  As other survivors have commented, it was almost a surreal experience and hard to believe it happened at all.

I guess I'm supposed to be here a while longer, so I treasure each day.

I salute all the survivors sand caregivers in our tiny "club" for their courage and patience.

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