Sunday night – Billy
I’m writing this about a month after the events here happened.. so I know things came out all right. but I’m writing them as they occurred that night to the best my memory of this strange time allows >> I’ll also say I’ve been reluctant to write ince that day as Billy and his family are keeping to themselves .. I’m not sure when I’ll publish this.. only when they say its ok >>
anyway.. here’s what happened:
Last night as we were falling asleep.. we got a call. It was 1 am.. and that’s never a good thing
it was our sister in law Shaun calling. My brother Billy was driving to a gig last night when he felt a ripping pain through his chest.. He’s a cardiothoracic surgeon so he knew what was happening.. At the time he figured it was an aortic dissection, its when the three layers that make up the walls of his aorta had separated and were restricting the flow of blood to all of his body. … Your aorta is your bodies largest and most important blood vessel and Billy knew he didn’t have much time to act. He called 911, called Shaun and called his Friend Joe Caselli, the best vascular surgeon he new.
Luckily.. if one can use a word like that in a situation like this. Billy was very near Texas Heart Institute where he worked. The ambulance came and Billy was able to tell them what was happening. They rushed him to the hospital and he was in surgery in lass than 30 minutes.. if he was anywhere else.. this would be a very different sort of story. ..
We were all in shock.. All through the night we got updates from Shaun.. and from our nephew Ben who’s also a doctor (neurologist..).
It was super serious. We found out later in the evening that Billy had had an aortic dissection , his Aorta had completely ruptured. .. His left carotid artery had been blocked, his right carotid has been spared.. which was super luckily.. as his brain still had blood flow. His entire aurtic arch was replaced with a Dacron prosthesis.. a surgery that had been invented in the Methodist hospital just next store by another famous heart surgeon Dr Michael DeBakey . .. His left carotid was also pathed with a Dacron graft and his descending aorta was patched with a TEVAR (???) stent. Unfortunately, Billy’s
HSMA (the artery that supplies blood to your intestines, and stomach) had also been badly damaged. That caused some ischemia in Billys intestines that also requited surgery to remove part of his intestines..
All in all it took a team of 10 surgeons 18 hours (!) to repair the damage and save Billys life. We learned later that the survival rate for an n event like this is only about 25% .. which are very scary odds.
As the night went on, we got sporadic updates from the doctors and nurses as relayed by Shaun and the family and kept in touch with my sister mary and her husband and my brother in law John who is also a CT surgeon..
By morning we knew that Billy had made it though the night.. the next day.. and the many days after when he was in that cardiac intensive care unit.. getting the best care anyone could have ever received. Doctors left Billy’s chest and abdomen open in order to monitor bleeding and and healing.. I’ve heard Billy talk about doing this with man of his patients.. it seemed surreal. He was intubated and breathing through a ventilator and his blood was being oxygenated by an ECMO device..
We all held our breaths for those first 4 or 5 days.. each day Billy got a little better. He was heavily sedated as is required by being intubated .. a few days in they lowered the drugs and brought Billy to light consciousness and he was able to move all of his legs and arms on command and give a thumbs up.. They had to bring the drugs back up because Billy was in deep discomfort form the ventilator and everything else..
so… that is Billy’s story so far,, it’s been a roller coaster for him and his family and for all of us.. but we are so grateful for the care he’s getting. Shaun and his 5 kids have been with Billy every hour.. there’s always someone there with him.. and the family is gving us updates everyy day. And we’re so grateful.. we’re holding off visiting until billys more stable and able to have guests.. in fact I’ on my way down there now to see him as I write this
.
I know I’m relling this story in kind of a clinical way, but its hard to talk about the emotional part. We nearly lost my brother.. my best friend, and one of the fnniest, most talented and without doubt smartest people I know. I ams so grateful to be abe to tell this story fromaa better place now..
We love you Billy !!!!!!!!!!!
nite all, nite sam
-me
