According to the American Heart Association, more than 40,000 kids are born with a congenital heart defect each year. (New Africa/ Adobe Stock)
A University of Montana public health instructor credits persistence and self-advocacy for her health and possibly her survival.
Katie Wagner, 38, said she started feeling some disturbing symptoms when she was 29, starting her long journey to figure out what was wrong. She said cardiologists dismissed her shortness of breath and chest pain, even when they started getting worse.
"The self-advocacy piece really comes into play that I kept pushing for answers, knowing something was wrong, right? And knowing that it was more than anxiety – that that, unfortunately, I think women in particular tend to hear that a lot," she said. "And I do have anxiety around not being able to breathe."
After years of emergency-room visits and seeing specialists, she said she finally found a cardiologist who put her on the right path. That doctor sent her to the University of Washington for testing that wasn't available in Montana. Doctors there discovered a potentially fatal heart condition – significant blood flow obstruction in the largest coronary artery in her heart. She had open-heart surgery in June, and awoke free of the chest pain that had affected her quality of life for so long.
Wagner said her condition – a myocardial bridge where the coronary artery tunnels through muscle and gets squeezed with every heartbeat – is usually benign. Hers was so serious that she was only getting half the normal blood flow through that artery. As a mom of two kids, ages six and eight, she said she came out of surgery feeling overwhelmingly grateful.
"Gratitude not just for the surgery, but for the life that this has already given me, and I'm just over four months post-op," she said. "I feel better than I have for a decade."
Wagner said she can dance with her kids now and feels like she has a second chance at life. With a Ph.D in health sciences and public health, Wagner knew her symptoms were serious, and she had to keep pushing for the care she needed. That's her message to others: Don't stop and don't give up hope.
"Trust your gut," she said. "You know when something's off. And I honestly, I don't know that I would be here if I didn't trust my gut."
