Takotsubo

It's been a tough couple of weeks. Mom's memorial last Friday went as expected. There were a couple of relatives that acted like Mom was Bill Gates and wanted to know where their cut was, but for the most part everyone behaved.

Before the memorial, my sister, my brother, and I met with the cardiologist that was caring for my mother. I had some questions, primarily how did somebody with back issues end up with heart failure. Particularly when the function of her heart was fine a couple of months ago.

Mom had a heart catheterization a couple of weeks before she died. Her arteries were fairly clean. Surprising considering how heavily she smoked. However, she suffered from Takotsubo cardiomyopathy.

This condition can really only be diagnosed with a heart cath. I've seen it a couple of times before and found it fascinating. The long and the short is that the main pumping chamber of the heart contracts abnormally. The lower part of the chamber doesn't really contract at all and the upper part over contracts. This gives the chamber (the left ventricle) a unique shape. It looks like a takotsubo. A takotsubo is a pot that the Japanese use to capture octopi. Usually a transient condition, most people recover in a couple of months. Mom didn't. Her heart slowed down and the muscle couldn't recover and just stopped working.

How does one begin to suffer from this condition? That's the sad part. It's also known as "stress induced cardiomyopathy" or "broken heart syndrome." Most commonly seen in postpartum women, it's also often seen in somebody that has lost a loved one or has suffered a profound loss.

I think my Mom was so stressed by her back condition and the thought of assisted living, that it had the same effect as losing a loved one. There are theories on the pathophysiology of the condition, but the reality is that nobody knows the exact cause.

It's just sad that my Mother was so distressed that it literally killed her. I have no idea what could have been done differently, but I wish we could have done something.