Jim Allen RIP

Jim had an enlarged heart (hypotrophic cardiomyopathy) and they placed and implanted defibrilator at Stanford back in 2000.  The devices need to be replaced every 6-7 years.  His was replaced a month ago.  In theory, should a cardiac arrest occur, the defibrilator fires and functions in much the same way as the paddLes they use to revive heart attack victims.   This was his third one.  We had just finished the Route 66 Motor on Sunday.  He was very up, happy and healthy.  Monday morning he and his dog  went out to get the paper.  I was fixing his coffee when I heard him scream.  He was unconscious  in the garage and his defibrillator went off and shocked him back.  I was calling 911 when he tried to get up and he had a second cardiac arrest and became unconscious the second time.  The defib fired and shocked him back but he hit his head on the  on the bike.   Because he was on so much blood thinner for his atrial fibrillation they transported him by ambulance to the ER.  We got there at 8 am and he was feeling good and we were just waiting for them to release him.  His cardiologist happened to be on duty at the time.  They did head and back X-rays and all seemed good.  Then I started to see him becoming more and more unresponsive as the hours went by.  Unfortunately they brought in a patient who had coded so he had to wait 3 hours before they could do a cardiac cath.  He had a 95% blockage in a major artery.  They put in a stent and gave him Plavix.  Within less than an hour he began to have seizures,his blood pressure bottomed out at 40 over 30.  They were afraid of bleeding in the brain so they started clotting factors to counteract the blood thinners.  They could reverse the effects of the Coumadin and heparin but there is no way to reverse the Plavix.  By the time they decided to fly him to MOBAC (a major neurosurgery hospital the effects had killed most of his brain.  He had a small amount of activity in the part of the brain that controls breathing.  They said because his blood was so thin, surgery would not help because his brain would be surrounded by blood immediately.  I had to make the decision to remove the ventilator.  I got in bed with him and held him until he died.  Probably more info than you wanted but I probably needed to get that off my chest.

Anyway, he loved you all so much and I know he can feel that love.

Thank you for you warm thoughts.