Things I Hate to See #913,461: A doctor getting a raised-eyebrow, quizzical look on her face while looking at my ECG.
Things I Hate to Hear #4,623,531: "Are you sure you've never had a heart attack?"
Well, I was pretty sure, but I did hedge my answer: Not that I know of.
And it turns out that I may just not have known. I've known people who hadn't known what they were having were heart attacks when first having them, and who had to be told by ER doctors, "yeah, that's a heart attack you're having there." But I kind of figured that if you had a heart attack and didn't notice it, the next thing you would notice would be be being dead, or in an ambulance with people yelling 'clear' and shocking you with paddles, or something.
I still don't know that I have had a heart attack, because this ECG was part of a physical for participating in a drug trial. It wasn't this doctor's job to diagnose me, just to establish whether or not I'm eligible to participate. So she sort of told me the minimum while telling me I need to take a copy of the ECG to my primary care provider.
That minimum: There seems to be some kind of "conduction problem" (i.e. problem with parts of the heart's transmission/receipt of electrical signals), and diabetics are among the population that might not notice heart attacks because diabetic neuropathy can reduce/block pain signals.
Bonus: The drug trial is liver-related, so there was also an ultrasound-type procedure to look at that. Some fibrosis. That surprised me too. Other than the usual "wooh! Party on!" stuff in my late teens and early 20s, I've never been a chronic heavy drinker and -- back to "that I know of" -- have never been diagnosed with e.g. hepatitis.
Possible second-round bonuses: They drew blood and I should hear about those results next week.
Looks like there might be treadmills and biopsies in my future.
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