Cheney Hunting Victim Remains Hospitalized After Heart Attack
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/OnCall/story?id=1621152&CMP=OTC-RSSFeeds0312
Feb. 15, 2006 — Harry Whittington was 30 yards away
from the vice president when he was accidentally shot
on a Texas ranch on Saturday, but the birdshot has
penetrated deeper than anyone had expected. After
suffering a heart attack as a direct result of the shooting,
Whittington spent Tuesday night in the intensive care unit.
"It is one problematic birdshot in this particular case
that we feel has caused the entire problem," said
Dr. David Blanchard of Christus Spohn Hospital Corpus
Christi-Memorial in Corpus Christi, Texas.
Doctors believe that a 5-millimeter birdshot is lodged
in his heart muscle.
"The birdshot was not ever in the chamber of the heart,"
said Peter Banko, the hospital's administrator.
Doctors performed a cardiac catheterization on Whittington,
78, inserting a thin probe through an artery into the heart.
They found his arteries to be clear.
"If he had bad arteries, he would be at much greater risk,"
said ABC News medical contributor Dr. Tim Johnson.
"His good health also means there's less strain on his heart
in general, despite his advanced age."
Whittington's heart attack was not "a traditional heart attack,"
but rather a result of a "direct traumatic injury to the muscle,"
Johnson said.
The doctors say a high-tech, 3-D heart scanner won't pinpoint
the birdshot because it is metal and will blur the image.
"If they have the machine, which they say they do,
why not try it?" Johnson said."It's a benign test, very quick."
The plan for now is to let the birdshot stay in Whittington's
heart muscle.
"At this point in time there is no plan to do surgery to
remove the birdshot," Banko said. "It is fixed in the heart
at this point in time."
Johnson said that if the birdshot was lodged in the
heart muscle, it was unlikely that it would migrate
into the heart. Whittington, however, could be at risk
for lead poisoning from the shots, although Johnson
said that was unlikely, too.
"It depends on the amount of birdshot he has in his body,"
Johnson said. "We have been told the count could be as
low as six and as high as 200. That's a big range, and
the more birdshot, the greater the chance of lead poisoning."
______________________________________________
.
|
