Stupid covid 😩

[sangtarah]

COVID + three weeks ago. I felt normal for the last week. Then I almost blacked out yesterday and felt so horrible since that I spent my morning in the ER. After blood tests, EKG, CT scans, and fluids I’m back at home. “Just” long covid, dr said. Go home and rest, hydrate. 
So, I don’t suggest a covid infection. 🥴

[mommyoffive]

Oh I am so sorry. I hope you feel better.

[Katy]

I’m so sorry. Hope you feel better soon. 

[KSera]

I'm so sorry. I hope you can rest really well and feel 100% soon.

[Kassia]

I'm so sorry!  Hope you feel back to normal soon.  

[Laura Corin]

I hope you can rest and that you feel better soon.

[Starr]

2 hours ago, sangtarah said:

“Just” long covid, dr said.

I'm so sorry. I hope you feel better soon.

[Faith-manor]

I am so sorry! Our Dd is a success story of recovering from long covid. But it was NOT easy. We are talking about modified bed rest for nearly six months, anti-inflammatory diet strictly observed, as much natural sunlight as possible to help with cell stimulation and full spectrum light bulbs all through the house, mega vitamins, turmeric (again to help with inflammation), B12 injections which her physician said showed some possible role in recovery from coronaviruses and helps with sleep quality, and doing pretty much nothing physical which meant that I practically raised my grandsons and ran her household for five months with occasional respites from my wonderful husband and sons when they could manage time off work. So essentially, I was exhausted by the end of October since I am perpetually anemic. But I am glad I did it! (She still refers to me as her personal Army General. I was draconian about not letting her do anything.)

I hope you find help.

[Not_a_Number]

7 hours ago, sangtarah said:

COVID + three weeks ago. I felt normal for the last week. Then I almost blacked out yesterday and felt so horrible since that I spent my morning in the ER. After blood tests, EKG, CT scans, and fluids I’m back at home. “Just” long covid, dr said. Go home and rest, hydrate. 
So, I don’t suggest a covid infection. 🥴

Ugh! Feel better soon. 

Was the initial positive test 3 weeks ago? Or did your symptoms resolve 3 weeks ago? 

[sangtarah]

6 hours ago, Not_a_Number said:

Ugh! Feel better soon. 

Was the initial positive test 3 weeks ago? Or did your symptoms resolve 3 weeks ago?

I was first positive on Nov 11.  For the past week I’ve been feeling good, not quite back to normal bc of an occasional headache, but strong and able to do house & farm chores, teach, etc. Then, wham, covid sucker punched. At least that is what the ER attributed my current malaise to. For the past 18 hours, my digestive system is in disarray and  I’ve been almost passing out. 

The CT scan didn’t show any clotting, but did show gallstones. And it revealed the source of my lower back pain. My lungs were clear. 
The ECG says: Interpretive Statements:SINUS RHYTHM WITH SINUS ARRHYTHMIA, LEFT ATRIAL ENLARGEMENT [-0.15mV P-WAVE IN V1/V21, POSSIBLE RIGHT VENTRICULAR CONDUCTION DELAY [RSR (QR) IN V1/2], NONSPECIFIC ST & T-WAVE ABNORMALITY

[MercyA]

I'm so sorry. 

[kbutton]

7 hours ago, sangtarah said:

I was first positive on Nov 11.  For the past week I’ve been feeling good, not quite back to normal bc of an occasional headache, but strong and able to do house & farm chores, teach, etc. Then, wham, covid sucker punched. At least that is what the ER attributed my current malaise to. For the past 18 hours, my digestive system is in disarray and  I’ve been almost passing out. 

The CT scan didn’t show any clotting, but did show gallstones. And it revealed the source of my lower back pain. My lungs were clear. 
The ECG says: Interpretive Statements:SINUS RHYTHM WITH SINUS ARRHYTHMIA, LEFT ATRIAL ENLARGEMENT [-0.15mV P-WAVE IN V1/V21, POSSIBLE RIGHT VENTRICULAR CONDUCTION DELAY [RSR (QR) IN V1/2], NONSPECIFIC ST & T-WAVE ABNORMALITY

You need to get into a cardiologist that deals with electrical issues with the heart. You also need to see someone that can explain the enlargement. That might or might not be a single cardiologist. Enlargement usually means something has been going on for a while.

Heart enlargement usually happens over time. You need an echocardiogram,  more than likely, to get at the details of the enlargement, etc.

I’ve known too many people with weird heart stuff to not encourage you to follow up with at least one kind of cardiologist and then only stopping there if they can explain things very well. You might need a cardiology team if the findings point to more than one kind of heart problem. Heart enlargement is not particularly benign unless you are really old and it’s stable. Some practitioners are more and less alarmed about certain things; you want someone who isn’t basing their outcomes on outdated data and guidelines (and is therefore brushing you off) if that makes sense. 

I won’t suggest that you do or do not have long Covid, but I’ve had surprisingly simple colds sideline me on and off for three weeks—we rarely get sick but joke that colds have only two timelines: 3 days or 3 weeks. Rest and take it easy though, for sure! 

[itsheresomewhere]

24 minutes ago, kbutton said:

You need to get into a cardiologist that deals with electrical issues with the heart. You also need to see someone that can explain the enlargement. That might or might not be a single cardiologist. Enlargement usually means something has been going on for a while.

Heart enlargement usually happens over time. You need an echocardiogram,  more than likely, to get at the details of the enlargement, etc.

I’ve known too many people with weird heart stuff to not encourage you to follow up with at least one kind of cardiologist and then only stopping there if they can explain things very well. You might need a cardiology team if the findings point to more than one kind of heart problem. Heart enlargement is not particularly benign unless you are really old and it’s stable. Some practitioners are more and less alarmed about certain things; you want someone who isn’t basing their outcomes on outdated data and guidelines (and is therefore brushing you off) if that makes sense. 

I won’t suggest that you do or do not have long Covid, but I’ve had surprisingly simple colds sideline me on and off for three weeks—we rarely get sick but joke that colds have only two timelines: 3 days or 3 weeks. Rest and take it easy though, for sure! 

I agree. Unfortunately, I am hearing about people being diagnosed with long covid and it is not always the case.  One was someone we know who was told it was long covid and her heart issue was as nothing related to long covid.  It was something her primary had missed over the years and age/defect just caught up with her.  

[dsmith]

I would definitely get in to a cardiologist. I still think that doctors overlook cardiac issues in women, even after seeing various awareness campaigns over the years. And I think it's easy to brush off things as being Covid related. Not to say that you couldn't be experience long covid, but I think this warrants further investigation.

[wathe]

Re EKG:  That reads like an automatically generated by computer interpretation, rather than a read by MD interpretation.  

For what it's worth, the computers aren't always very smart.

 

[KSera]

1 minute ago, wathe said:

For what it's worth, the computers aren't always very smart.

In your experience, do they tend to over-diagnose issues, or miss issues on EKG?

[wathe]

1 minute ago, KSera said:

In your experience, do they tend to over-diagnose issues, or miss issues on EKG?

They are often at least partly wrong.  Sometimes ridiculously and completely wrong.

Edited December 2, 2022 by wathe

[kbutton]

19 minutes ago, wathe said:

They are often at least partly wrong.  Sometimes ridiculously and completely wrong.

Or...

If an ER or any medical facility/provider is willing to have a machine interpret an EKG and not put in an overriding response ON THE RECORD, then they should be willing to stand by that interpretation that is ON THE RECORD to get the patient follow based on the only interpretation that is ON THE RECORD.

Or just not allow machine interpretation at all.

We had an issue where the ER repeated an EKG on my son to get the finding they wanted and explained away the original finding (the nurse must not have put the lead on correctly--the nurse turned herself upside down and inside out getting the lead placed correctly when it would not stick!!!) when the second one came back without that odd, sticky, inconvenient piece of information that was in the first EKG and supported one of the concerns we expressed. The entire visit from stem to stern was utterly managed in that way. The charting for that visit is an actual lie from one end to the other. My DH advocated for my son over and over and was ignored, and my DH was correct. My DH has MORE DIRECT EXPERIENCE with what was wrong with my son than the resident and attending that were ignoring him. It was infuriating.

Machines are not the only entities that can be ridiculously and completely wrong, but at least they don't suffer from cognitive biases that threaten people's life or health. 

44 minutes ago, dsmith said:

I would definitely get in to a cardiologist. I still think that doctors overlook cardiac issues in women, even after seeing various awareness campaigns over the years. And I think it's easy to brush off things as being Covid related. Not to say that you couldn't be experience long covid, but I think this warrants further investigation.

This. I have to look for a new cardiologist because mine doesn't care about my heart. There is literally NOTHING abnormal that can show up in my testing that would dynamite him off his moorings, and I research things pretty well. Well enough to know that the findings, which are consistently worse over time, are important. Even if they can't be fixed, I deserve to know what they mean. When even the literature doesn't say the same thing across the board about whether it can be fixed or whether worsening can be prevented, a nuanced conversation is even more important! 

And that's just with my heart. I have many more examples.

 

 

[sangtarah]

Thank you for the concern! 
I have an appt with my primary on Tuesday. I asked if they would review the results and call me about them today, but was told they don’t do that. So I guess I will get his opinion Tuesday. Hopefully I will feel better by then. 
I have suspected that I have heart/circulation issues for a couple years. I intermittently have skipped beats, but the last time I spoke to my primary, he said it wasn’t frequent enough to investigate. Maybe now it will get some attention. 

[Harriet Vane]

Just now, sangtarah said:

Thank you for the concern! 
I have an appt with my primary on Tuesday. I asked if they would review the results and call me about them today, but was told they don’t do that. So I guess I will get his opinion Tuesday. Hopefully I will feel better by then. 
I have suspected that I have heart/circulation issues for a couple years. I intermittently have skipped beats, but the last time I spoke to my primary, he said it wasn’t frequent enough to investigate. Maybe now it will get some attention. 

Re skipped beats--

My son was born with skipped beats, and we spent five years of his early life monitoring him periodically. What I learned at that point is that they do not intervene unless those skips are happening 25% of the time. The only way to determine that is by wearing a Holter monitor for 24-hours (or more). If you've not spoken to a cardiologist or done a Holter monitor for a day, that might be a good step to take. 

[kbutton]

2 minutes ago, sangtarah said:

Thank you for the concern! 
I have an appt with my primary on Tuesday. I asked if they would review the results and call me about them today, but was told they don’t do that. So I guess I will get his opinion Tuesday. Hopefully I will feel better by then. 
I have suspected that I have heart/circulation issues for a couple years. I intermittently have skipped beats, but the last time I spoke to my primary, he said it wasn’t frequent enough to investigate. Maybe now it will get some attention. 

If it doesn't get attention, and your insurance allows self referrals to cardiology, I would ask around for who is good and book an appointment on your own. I have zero idea how serious the findings are even if they are read by a person, just that enlargement is really not good or something that occurs overnight.

[kbutton]

On 12/2/2022 at 1:40 PM, wathe said:

Re EKG:  That reads like an automatically generated by computer interpretation, rather than a read by MD interpretation.  

For what it's worth, the computers aren't always very smart.

For what it's worth, I hope this turns out to be the case for the OP. 

@sangtarah, has a different interpretation shown up in your chart? 

[sangtarah]

2 hours ago, kbutton said:

For what it's worth, I hope this turns out to be the case for the OP. 

@sangtarah, has a different interpretation shown up in your chart? 

No. I go to the primary tomorrow, so I’ll update afterwards. Thank you for thinking of me! I am feeling better - not bed bound at the moment, which is very nice. But I’m taking things easy, very low key. 

[sangtarah]

Quick update after the dr appt: he said the ekg was fine! So my heart is in the clear. Other stuff (dizzy, digestion, etc) we will give another couple weeks to clear up and hopefully it will all get better. He did order an ultrasound of my gallbladder, but those stones aren’t due to covid. So, basically, all vitals look good and I need to take it easy  until I’m covid free.