dong
Member
My husband had a mitral valve repair with maze surgery on March 3, 2008. On his first echo on Apr 15, 2008 after the surgery, he was diagnosed with pericardial effusion. He took a methyPrednisone pack for one week, but no improvement. Then he started prednisone from 40mg, decreased dose by 5mg every two days, and the fluid was reduced on his May 16 Echo and to very low level on June 16 Echo. He went to work after June 25. But the fluid had come back since Oct 20. He tried Motrin for 10 days, not worked. Then 40mg prednisone, decreased dose by 5mg every three days, there was no significant difference in terms of fluid level on his 10/20, 10/30, and 11/28 echo. He started colchicine since 11/28/08, no improvement in his 1/20 echo. Then continue colchicin, but the fluid level was still same as of today. Every time we talked to our cardiologist, he said no worry and said my husband should work as normal. My husband is a computer engineer, his work is very stressful and requires a lot of overtime. We also saw another cardiologist at the end of last year, he said some people have fluid around heart all time, and no worry. But when we saw our cardiologist today, he suspected that my husband had constrictive pericarditis. We are very scared. I read somewhere that rest is very important for pericarditis recovery. We are very regret. If my husband got enough rest last time when he took prednisone, maybe he would recover. Now is there anything aggressive we can do except pericardiectomy? Will pericardiocenteisis help? Or another high dose of prednisone plus rest? If the prednisone doesn?t work, does that mean no other drug else will work? I am sorry for the long email, but I am desperate.
