Dear Shock for Life listers,

Hi. My name is Joel, and I just discovered this mailing list in the course
of a search for online forums where people discuss the implanted
cardiodefibrillator (ICD).

I'm 64, and after a visit to the emergency room of a local hospital and a
days-long stay in Intensive Care, I was diagnosed with dilated
cardiomyopathy. as most of you probably know, this means that the upper left
ventricle of my heart is enlarged and weakened, preventing it from pumping
fresh blood into my body as efficiently as the normal rate. For those who
are interested in the pertinent details, a series of echocardiograms have
shown my ejection fraction to be lower than 35 per cent, even at best.

I'm maintaining myself in a non-emergency state by taking several drugs that
are usually prescribed for this condition as well as congestive heart
failure and others. But my cardiologist believes that this condition puts me
in statistical danger of suffering cardiac arrhythmia and sudden,
unpreventable death. So he, as well as an electrocardiologist I consulted
for further explanation, recommend that I have a cardiodefibrillator
implanted to save my life if and when my heart does go into such a state.

I know the helpfulness of these devices is generally agreed upon. But as
I've never before undergone any kind of surgery, and because I don't know
much about the potential problems an ICD might cause, I'd like to hear
something from other heart patients experienced with it. For instance, in
the little online research I've managed to do, I've gotten the idea that the
ICD might go off more often than I'd imagine, each time making me feel as if
I'd been kicked in the chest by a horse. It just sounds like a scary way to
live, but of course so is putting up with the idea that I might drop dead
any time without warning from a heart arrhythmia, without even a chance to
clutch at my chest and call 911, as in a heart attack.

I'll welcome any advice or just discussion. I'll rely on this mailing list
for messages, because I'm legally blind and the screen reader (text to
speech) program that allows me to operate my computer has a hard time
helping me navigate around the Yahoo Groups Web pages, which are very
complicated if you're not looking at them visually. Back messages, archives,
etc. aren't easy to access even though I can tell there seem to be some
tables and dates and links to messages. All I can find on the home page are
some obvious spam emails and then all that complicated table information. So
if you want to refer me to a specific archived message, please include the
URL of that message in the post, so I can click on it and be taken directly
to that message.

Thanks very much to all. I know I have a lot to learn, and I feel as if I
ought to make a decision to schedule an implant as soon as I feel a little
better informed about what to expect.

Thanks,
Joel