My personal path with PH
Roy Dewar was diagnosed with idiopathic pulmonary arterial hypertension in January 2020 and has spent the last year adjusting to life with the condition. Here, the 77-year-old Scot looks back on an ‘interesting’ 12 months – and explains how he stays positive in the face of change.
I
was always in quite good health before the PH, aside from a couple of illnesses I picked up whilst travelling around the world for work. Around three years ago though, I started noticing breathlessness. I used to enjoy walking a lot, but suddenly even walking to the bus would leave me out of breath. I was initially diagnosed with atrial fibrillation [a heart condition that causes an irregular and often abnormally fast heart rate] but after the breathlessness got worse, I had an echocardiogram at a hospital in Edinburgh. It showed that my heart was slightly enlarged, but there wasn’t cause for concern. In October 2019, my symptoms took a turn for the worse and I blacked out whilst walking up the steps at a train station. The fall caused me to lose three teeth and I broke every bone in my face.
SPRING 2022 emphasis 20
That’s when I started pushing for more tests, but even after being referred to a consultant cardiologist, I was told nothing was wrong.
“Being diagnosed was a relief” It was only in September of 2020, when I saw another cardiologist, that pulmonary hypertension was mentioned as a possibility. I was referred to the Scottish Pulmonary Vascular Unit at the Golden Jubilee Hospital down in Glasgow, where the consultant confirmed that it looked like I had PH and referred me for further tests to finally confirm it. The very next day, back in my hometown of Cupar in Fife, I had another fall. This was again as a result of a blackout but it did not do any damage this time. After a series of tests, I was officially
diagnosed with idiopathic pulmonary hypertension - something I had never heard of - in January 2021. To be honest, being diagnosed was a relief to me, because I finally knew what was wrong. During the course of my PH diagnosis, doctors also discovered a lesion in my lower left lung, and this continues to be monitored. It doesn’t seem to be growing, which is good news, but of course it has been an additional worry. Treatment for my PH started the day I got my diagnosis. I’m on Sildenafil and Ambrisentan, plus 16 hours of oxygen a day. I split the oxygen into eight hours during the day and eight hours at night, and I take mobile canisters with me in a rucksack if I’m going out. I’ve got used to the oxygen quickly and it hasn’t been nearly as bad as I expected. It seems to work well.
