We arrived at 6:30 am and were able to meet with the team of doctors before he has taken away for his surgery. I've never seen so many doctors and assistants(20 or so) for one patient. Wow. He is in great hands. Melissa hand picked all the doctors and assistants and nurses for Joel's surgery. She referred to them as the "A Team" :).
Joel had an MRI and MRA yesterday and they found that he actually has another problem...he has an aneurysm in his aorta (what John Ritter died from). So, they will be taking care of that too during the open heart surgery and hopefully, putting a graft in, if possible. Otherwise, they will put a tissue valve in. This complicates the surgery a little more and they expect the surgery to be about 6 hours. He will also be in the hospital for at least week now.We are so lucky this was caught because aorta aneurysms have no symptoms -- until after the fact. Joel's cardiologist said last week -- she wanted to just do a little more checking and a few more test -- thank GOD she did. They called us late last night to inform us of the test results. Par for the course :).
His team of docs and nurses are calling me throughout his surgery with updates. I just got the first call five minutes ago. They cut him open at 9:15 and when they get him on the heart and lung machine -- they will let me know.
That's all for now. Love, Michelle
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