Graft failure after bypass surgery?!

Graft failure after bypass surgery?

MY GUY had 5 bypasses (quintuple?) in April. He was feeling fine and regaining strength. He began having chest pains about two months after the surgery and went to the cardiologist. He has had an upper GI to rule out hernia, reflux, etc., and EKG, which looked ok. His blood pressure has been good and he has been going to Cardiac Rehab, but the pain still comes and goes. A few days ago, he had another angioplasty, and three of the five grafts had failed. (Some kind of occulusion). He even overheard the Dr say that he could not see them during this procedure. What would make the grafts fail? he is scheduled to have a Myocardial Viability Scan in a week or so and possibly have stents put in or at the worst, another open heart surgery. Needless to say, we both are very scared. Is this very common that the grafts would close up?

It happens more than you might think. I worked for a cardiologist who was involved with a study where they did an angiogram on every CABG patient at a one week interval and then a month and then six months. About 20% of the time one or more of the grafts per angiogram had closed at one month. The difference in this phenomenon and that of an acute MI is the graft typically is revascularizing a region that was already being deprived of blood supply prior to the procedure. (So his current situation is no worse than prior to the CABG) In your significant other's case, the fact that the closure is actually causing angina is a good sign that the myocardium is viable. Dead tissue does not hurt.

The sucess rate of stenting grafts is generally very good - especially since these are "new" blocks that have not had years to calcify and harden.

I know this must be very hard for you to swallow but your cardiology team seems to be on top the problem and has a plan to address it. I might suspect that after the stents are deployed then additional anti-coagulation therapy might be added to try to prevent any further blockages.

Good luck.