“We are so thankful we managed to find out about Dr. Wasty and the fantastic medical team at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center! We are eternally grateful to them all and would highly recommend them to anyone in a similar situation to ours.”
After retirement, Elly and her husband Mark moved to Georgia. However, for a few months each year they travel back to their home in Indonesia which is where Elly is from and where Mark worked for many years before retiring.
After moving back to the states, they began a daily routine of walking in the mornings as a way of trying to keep fit but sometimes Elly noticed that she became short of breath during their walks and the frequency of this continued to increase over time. Then one day on a trip to a shopping mall in February 2023, just walking from the car into the mall not only caused Elly to become short of breath, but she also experienced chest pains which was unusual.
It was then that Mark, who had already had four stents over the past years to open blocked arteries, reminded Elly that shortness of breath was one of his symptoms and said that it might be a good idea for her to see a doctor about this problem and get it checked out. They then made an appointment to see a local cardiologist near their home in Georgia.
The Cardiologist talked to Elly then scheduled her for a heart catheterization procedure on March 1st, 2023. Not long after that procedure began, the doctor told Elly that he had found multiple blockages and that stenting would not be possible and she would need to undergo triple bypass surgery as soon as possible.
On the way home, Elly and Mark discussed all that the doctor said and wondered if there were any other options and possibly getting a second opinion. They also already had tickets scheduled to travel back to Indonesia in three weeks and explored the option of having the procedure there. After exploring that possibility, those ideas did not turn out to be very practical.
They asked again if her blockages could be corrected with stents as they would accept the risks of not optimally completely fixing the problem. However, the doctor was adamant that it was not possible to use stents and that a bypass was the only option.
Seeing the depression and anxiety Elly was going through, Mark spent a lot of time that night on the computer searching the internet for any possible “alternatives to bypass surgery” and a few pages in he came across an article entitled “The story of Claire S. (age 76) – A Less Invasive Alternative to Triple Bypass Surgery.” Claire’s doctors said they found it impossible to perform coronary angioplasty because the blockages were in locations that were too difficult to reach so she was told she needed triple bypass surgery. Dr. Najam Wasty, Director of the Cardiac Catheterization Laboratories at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center, performed coronary stenting for Claire in December 2017 and more than five years later she was still feeling great and enjoying life.
This sounded very much like Elly’s situation. Seeing the similarities in age and circumstances between Claire and Elly, Mark decided to contact Dr. Wasty. Dr. Wasty requested a CD of Elly’s catheterization procedure and a copy of the written report from the cardiologist in Georgia. After his review of her case, Dr. Wasty called and spoke to Elly and said that although coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) / open heart surgery is the Class 1 recommendation for multiple blockages, if the patient’s preference is to avoid surgery multiple stents can often solve the problem quite satisfactorily and he was sure that he could help her. “He was very accommodating in arranging a schedule for us to travel to Newark Beth Israel Medical Center, have the procedure (four stents) on March 17, and return home the next day in time to make our scheduled flight to Indonesia a week later on March 23” said Mark.
Elly and Mark had an amazing trip to Indonesia and had her 6-month check-up with Dr. Wasty in New Jersey at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center in September 2023. All her test results looked good, and she is doing very well.
“We are so thankful we managed to find out about Dr. Wasty and the fantastic medical team at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center! We also want to thank Dr. Wasty’s very professional assistant Maria who was an enormous help to us in coordinating and scheduling our appointments. We are eternally grateful to them all and would highly recommend them to anyone in a similar situation to ours.”
Whoever your heart beats for, our hearts beat for you. To connect with a top cardiovascular specialist at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center, call 888-724-7123 or visit Heart and Vascular Care.