On Thursday, Sept 24, 2009 I was playing tennis during our weekly Men’s Team Tennis night at the Mercer Island Country Club – an hour of tennis, a few hours of socializing. I wasn’t supposed to play that night (our team had a bye week), but my wife’s father was in town and they had gone out to a friend’s house, so I had a couple of hours while my son Ben was at football practice.

I dropped him off at 7:00 and headed to the club to hit with the pro and hang with the guys. At about 8:45 I got a call from my wife to say she was nearby and could get Ben from practice if I wanted to stay longer. Sounded good to me… A little while later, the guy who runs the tennis program said they needed a sub on court 6 because one guy didn’t show up for the 9:30 match. I volunteered and called my wife to tell her I’d be home later than expected.

It was a fun game of doubles against a couple of friends, not too strenuous, plenty of unforced errors as you’d expect from average tennis players. Laughing off the mistakes, waiting for our hour to be up so we could get to the beer fridge and buffet. About 45 minutes into our match, the game score was 6-6 and I was about to receive serve up Love-40.

I recall checking my watch – 10:16 – and then started to feel a little light headed, like you might when you stand up too quickly. I figured it would pass, but it didn’t.

I felt a little worse, more woozy, and when the serve came I swung and missed horribly. It felt like everything was moving in slow motion. I didn’t know what was happening and thought I might pass out, so I got down on my knees. (I had heard that often that banging your head from the fall is more serious than what’s causing you to faint.)

The guys thought I was joking because I had missed such an easy shot.

From my knees I went blank and fell forward onto my face – that’s when they knew it was no joke.

My friend started screaming for someone to call 911 and get a doctor. He rolled me over – my face was bloody and I was gasping for breath. Fortunately for me there was a doctor playing just two courts over, and another in the lounge next to the courts. They rushed over to me and initially thought I had either fallen and hit my head (bloody face) or was having a seizure.

They checked for a pulse – none. I wasn’t breathing.

Immediately, within about 30 seconds of me going down, these two heroes started CPR – taking turns doing chest compressions and mouth-to-mouth. The current CPR protocol is quite rigorous and calls for many quick and deep compressions and then two breaths.

Within a few minutes someone had retrieved the club’s Automated External Defibrillator (AED) from the front desk. It was a Powerheart AED. The docs attached the pads and fired it up, pressed the button to deliver the first shock. (I was told later that I made some sound but still had no pulse.)

The AED diagnosed my condition and told them to shock me again, which they did. Finally, a beat – ventricular tachycardia (v-tach) – my heart was beating rapidly but beating. This was about 5-8 minutes after I went down and by then the EMTs had arrived…

Moments later I came to with an oxygen mask on my face and 4-5 guys standing over me. I recall they didn’t look like the guys I play tennis with – they were a lot younger and a lot better looking. Also, they were all wearing blue shirts – I figured they were firefighters.

As I was coming to I recall I thought I was still playing the point in my mind, so apparently I asked who had won the point or I was trying to claim it didn’t count. I asked my friend to call my wife, but she was already there. [Caller ID showed the club called home at 10:20.]

At this point I was lucid and answering the EMT’s questions, I tried to get up, too, and still didn’t realize what had happened. I thought I just passed out. I told my wife I was fine…

They got me in the ambulance and the medics asked me how much pain I was feeling in my chest. I hadn’t really noticed it until he asked but it felt like someone was pressing their knuckles into my sternum with full force. I was talking to them so it felt like no big deal, but it still hurt a lot maybe the pain was 7 out of 10. I didn’t know if the pain was from the chest compressions or my heart beating so fast.

They said they might have to shock me again – I protested a bit because I thought it would hurt. “Well sir, your heart rate is at 255” is what I remember him saying… I told them to do what they needed to do. “We’re going to give you some medicine to try to slow it down… count backwards from 10 for me.” I got to zero and felt the same when I started at 10, so I made a joke – none of them even snickered. “Start again, sir.” That’s when I realized it must be serious. I got to 7, which is the last thing I remember until I woke up in the hospital the next morning.

In the interim, the paramedics intubated me and set up an IV line, and apparently I was shocked again in the ambulance. I was told later there were a dozen people waiting for me in the ER, where I think I was shocked a fourth time and given more drugs. Once I was stabilized, they did an angiogram and some other tests to try to determine what happened.

The doctors found clear arteries – no blockage, no problem with the plumbing, which is good news – so they determined it was an electrical malfunction.

Friday I was told that my parting gift from the hospital would be an Implantable Cardioverter Defibrillator (ICD) to keep me safe in case an episode like this happened again – there’s a chance it will never happen again. They would monitor me in the hospital over the weekend and do the hour-long procedure on Monday morning. Everything went smoothly and I was discharged on Tuesday (9/29), and I’m feeling great.

What I had was Sudden Cardiac Arrest which is technically different from a heart attack. This from the Sudden Cardiac Arrest Association:

Sudden cardiac arrest (SCA) is a leading cause of death in the U.S., killing nearly 300,000 people each year. That’s more than the total death rate for breast cancer, lung cancer, and HIV/AIDS combined. During SCA, heart function ceases abruptly and without warning. When this occurs, the heart is no longer able to pump blood to the rest of the body, and in over 90% of victims, death occurs.

This is usually caused when the electrical impulses in the affected heart become rapid (ventricular tachycardia, or “VT”) or chaotic (ventricular fibrillation, or “VF”), or both. These irregular heart rhythms are arrhythmias. The general public and media often mistakenly refer to SCA as a “massive heart attack.”

SCA is an electrical problem, whereby the arrhythmia prevents the heart from pumping blood to the brain and vital organs. There is an immediate cessation of the heart. In most cases, there are no warning signs or symptoms. A heart attack is a “plumbing” problem caused by one or more blockages in the heart’s blood vessels, preventing proper flow, and the heart muscle dies. Symptoms include chest pain, radiating pain in left arm, between shoulder blades, and/or jaw, difficulty breathing, dizziness, nausea and vomiting, and sweating. In some cases, a heart attack may lead to a sudden cardiac arrest event.

There aren’t really words to describe how fortunate I am, so I’ll share another statistic: It is estimated that nearly 95 percent of all people who experience SCA die before reaching the hospital – due to the time lag from attack to CPR and defibrillation – and among those who survive many often have temporary or long-lasting neurological effects.

The fact that CPR began immediately and an AED was available are the only reasons I survived, along with my brain and organs intact.

Had this hit me while I was driving, walking in the parking lot, sleeping, or doing just about anything other than playing tennis where and when I was, the outcome would have been much different.

Some people have certain heart arrhythmia that could lead to having an ICD or pacemaker implanted as a precaution, but for many of us there are no warning signs for SCA.

However, a regular physical can help identify and prevent treatable conditions… And an AED in your office, workout club, school, or place of worship could save a life.

To my friends and anyone else who asks about my experience, I ask these two questions:

• When was your last physical?
• Do you have AEDs at your office and workout club?

Eric Rothenberg
December 18, 2009

–> See Eric tell his story on video.

P.S. Not how I had planned to get in the newspaper but you can read more about my incident here:
Mercer Island Reporter: http://www.pnwlocalnews.com/east_king/mir/news/63615207.html
Patient Power Blog: http://blog.patientpower.info/2009/09/28/a-lifesaving-zapper/

Be Sociable, Share!

•