Hi everyone,
Let me introduce myself.
My name is John. My wife Pat, who is now 86, is a double breast cancer survivor of many years, first op prior to 2000 and second op around 2012.
In the first instance, Pat opted to have the TRAMFLAP procedure to reconstruct the breast. A few weeks later while recovering from the trauma at home, Pat started to have severe chest pains, she put it down to “it’s just the op” and got on with life, but the pains continued and became more severe.
After 12 months or so I took Pat to the doc and he said, “aha, classic signs of Angina, he’s a prescription for a GTN spray.”
The spray worked but I had suspicions about the cause and insisted that Pat had her heart checked out and guess what, perfectly healthy heart, strong as an ox.
So we set about trying to find the cause as it was worrying, my thoughts were that there was a connection with the tramflap and after two years of back and forth to the hospital a consultant eventually admitted that the cause was most likely to be the straining muscle pressing on the esophagus causing the body to feel stressed around the heart.
This diagnosis was, after two years of tests, a rather ‘of the cuff’ explanation because I think they thought our intention was to take litigation against the hospital trust. Far from it we just wanted to know what was going on. The diagnosis actually fits with our thoughts because the angina attacks usually happen when Pat has been bending over picking thing up of the floor (grandchildren’s toys etc) or after a while at the ironing board.
When it came to the other breast, it was simply removed and the surgery was simple in comparison and has no physical after affects.
So, if you have developed angina after a tram flap operation, this may be the cause.
From a man’s point of view, a tram flap op on the one you love is the most intrusive that you can imagine, to see a once beautiful body ripped to shreds and sown up is very distressing. I would say, don’t do it, seek an alternative reconstruction. a tramflap will ruin your figure and affect your well being both physically and mentally.
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