Heart Surgeon, Prince...Husband!. Kate Hardy
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Summer has inherited the gene too?’ Luc guessed.
‘Yes. With a family history that spans at least two generations—and I’m pretty sure if you went back there would be more—they’ll be good candidates. And you’ll get a spread of age and gender.’
* * *
Even though Kelly was clearly devastated by her husband’s loss, she was still thinking about his family and trying to help them, putting their needs before her own, Luc thought. He could certainly talk to their current medical practitioner and see if they would be suitable candidates for his trial.
But something else Kelly had said struck a chord with him. Maybe, just maybe, they could help each other out. He’d had a crazy scheme percolating in the back of his head for a while now, but he hadn’t found the right person to help him. Maybe Kelly was the one; she was in a similar kind of position, so she might just understand his problem.
He was normally a good judge of character and he liked what he’d seen of Kelly Phillips so far; her colleagues had spoken highly of her, too. So maybe it was time to take a risk—after he’d had the chance to check out her background and got to know her a little more, because he wasn’t reckless or stupid enough to ask her right at this very second. ‘If you can ask their family doctor to contact me, we’ll go through all the prelims and see if they fit the criteria,’ he said.
‘Thank you. I really appreciate that,’ she said.
‘It’s not a promise that it will definitely happen, but it’s a promise that I’ll do my best to help,’ he said.
‘That’s fair.’ She smiled at him. ‘So did you train at the Royal Hampstead Free?’
‘Yes, and I loved working with the team there. But then this opportunity came up, so I applied for the role,’ he said. ‘How about you?’
‘I trained here,’ she said, ‘and cardiology was my favourite rotation. I love the area, too, so I stayed. What made you become a cardiac surgeon?’ she asked, sounding curious. Then she grimaced. ‘Sorry. Ignore me; that was a bit rude and pushy. You really don’t have to answer.’
‘It goes with the territory. Given who my family is, most people expect me to be part of the family business rather than being a medic.’ He shrugged. ‘That’s what probably would have happened—but my best friend, Giacomo, died when we were fifteen.’ He winced slightly as he looked at her.
‘From a heart condition?’ she guessed.
He nodded. ‘I’m sorry if this opens any scars, but yes—the same one as your husband.’
‘HCM.’ Three little letters that had blown her world apart.
‘It wasn’t genetic, in Giacomo’s case. His family doctor thought the chest pains were just teenage anxiety because Giacomo was worrying about his exams.’
She blinked. ‘Chest pains in a teenager and the doctor didn’t send him for tests?’
‘No. Knowing what I do now, I wish he had. His condition would’ve shown up on the ECG, and then medication or an ICD might’ve saved him. But hindsight is a wonderful thing.’ He shrugged. ‘Giacomo was playing football at school with me at lunchtime when he collapsed and died. The teachers tried to give him CPR but they couldn’t get his heart started again.’
She reached across the table and squeezed his hand for a moment, conveying her sympathy. ‘I’m sorry. That must’ve been hard for you.’
‘It was. He was the brother I never had.’ And it had shocked him profoundly to come face to face with his own mortality at the age of fifteen. Giacomo had been the first person he’d ever known to die, and the fact it had happened in front of him had affected him deeply. Not wanting to feel that way again, he’d put up a slight emotional wall between himself and everyone he loved. ‘I’m reasonably close to both my sisters,’ he added, ‘but we don’t talk in quite the same way, with Eleonora being two years older than I am and Giulia being five years younger.’
‘So you wanted to save other families going through what your best friend’s family went through?’
Just what he suspected she was trying to do, too. He nodded. ‘Becoming a doctor pretty much helped me to come to terms with losing him. And I like my job—bringing people back from the brink and giving them a second chance to make the most of life.’
‘Me, too,’ she said.
When they’d finished lunch, they headed back to the cardiac ward together.
‘Thank you for lunch,’ Luc said.
‘Pleasure. I might see you later today—if not, see you tomorrow and have a good afternoon,’ Kelly said.
‘You, too,’ he replied with a smile.
And how bad was it that he was really looking forward to seeing her?
ON TUESDAY MORNING, Kelly was due in to the cath lab. Her first patient, Peter Jefferson, looked incredibly nervous, and his knuckles were white where he was gripping his wife’s hand.
She introduced herself to them both. ‘Come and sit down. I promise this looks much scarier than it is. I’m going to check your pulse and your blood pressure, Mr Jefferson, and then I’ll put a little plastic tube called a cannula into your arm. Then all you have to do is lie on the couch for me, hold your breath and keep still for a few seconds, and the scanner will take 3D pictures of your heart so I can take a look at what’s going on. Then we can talk about it and decide the best way to treat you to stop the chest pain. Is that OK?’
He nodded.
‘I’m going to inject some special dye into your veins to help the scanner take the pictures. It’ll make you feel a bit warm and you might notice a funny taste in your mouth, but that’s completely normal and it’ll only last for about thirty seconds,’ she reassured him.
‘And it’s not going to hurt?’ He was still gripping his wife’s hand.
‘It’s not going to hurt,’ she said. ‘If you’re worried about how you’re feeling at any stage, just tell me. I might need to give you some medicine called a beta-blocker to slow your heart down very slightly, or some GTN spray under your tongue to make the arteries in your heart get a little bit wider—that will help me get better pictures of your heart. But it won’t hurt,’ she promised.
‘It’s just the chest pain has been so bad lately,’ Mrs Jefferson said, ‘and the medicine our family doctor gave him doesn’t help.’
Angina that couldn’t be helped by medication often meant that the arteries were seriously narrowed, and the treatment for that could mean anything from a simple stent through to bypass surgery under general anaesthetic. Hopefully a stent would be enough, but she wasn’t going to worry him until she could review the scan pictures.
She gave them both a reassuring smile. ‘Once we’ve gone through the tests, I should have a better idea how to help you. Can I just check that you’ve stayed off coffee, tea, fizzy drinks and chocolate yesterday and today, Mr Jefferson?’
He nodded.
‘And he’s been eating better lately and stopped smoking,’ Mrs Jefferson added.
‘Two of the best things you can do,’ Kelly said. ‘OK, Mr Jefferson. When you’re ready, I’ll check your blood pressure.’
As she’d expected, the first reading was really high; a lot of patients were so nervous about the tests that it sent their blood pressure sky-high. By the third reading, he was beginning to relax and Kelly was a little happier with the numbers.
Once she’d put the cannula in, she asked Mr Jefferson to lie on the scanner couch with his arms above his head.