98 AWW.COM.AU AUGUST 2017
PHOTOGRAPHS SUPPLIED AND USED WITH PERMISSION.As Australian survivors reveal, they
were just putting away groceries,
cleaning, checking emails, coming
home from the gym, eating dinner or
even, worryingly often, caring for a
new baby. Even doctors often don’t
suspect that their young, fit patient
has had a heart attack (usually the
first sign of a SCAD), let alone a
coronary tear. No one is sure what
causes SCAD or what’s the best way
to treat it. Survivors are sent home,
anxious it may hit them again,
struggling to resume a confident life.
Pam McKenzie,
Age 46
Even internationally, little
research has been done but in
Australia, funds permitting,
that is about to change –
thanks to the “good stubborn”
efforts of Pam McKenzie, a
Target cashier from Busselton,
WA, and the Victor Chang
Cardiac Research Institute’s
Professor Bob Graham, a man
with a reputation for picking up
cases from the “too hard”
basket.
“Apparently I’m the first
non-medical, non-scientific person
to co-author a research paper,”
Pam says of the pair’s initial,
recently published, study. “Even
the [Target] State Manager called
to tell me how proud she was.”
Pam’s own SCAD incident
happened on Easter Sunday,
- She was 43, healthy and
active, and had just finished an
Easter egg hunt with the family.
She was loading the washing machine
when she felt a click in her chest.
When she developed chest pains and
nausea, not wanting to worry her four
children, then aged 16-23, she went
into her bedroom to call an ambulance.
By the time she reached hospital,
paramedics had given her a nitro
spray to ease her symptoms and she
was so cheerful, nurses told her it was
probably indigestion. Typically, too,
an electrocardiogram (ECG) showed
nothing untoward. However,
Australian victims are fortunate in
“No one is
sure what
causes SCAD
or the best way
to treat it.”
“N i
HEART
FAC TLiza Stearn
with Lochie
and Ella. Liza’s
heart literally
stopped.Pam McKenzie (far right) six months
before her attack, with (from left)
daughters Kalila, Jacinta and Rebecca
and granddaughter Melody.that it’s one of the few countries
that routinely checks troponin
blood levels. They confirmed Pam had
suffered a heart attack. A subsequent
angiogram revealed a tear in her main,
left artery.
“It was all a blur,” she says. “They
showed me diagrams and plastic
hearts and everyone was really serious
but I couldn’t get my head around it.”Back home, she saw the kids’
uneaten Easter eggs on the kitchen
bench and wept. “I’d ruined Easter,”
she says. “I was terrified it was going
to happen again, especially as there
had been no warning signs and no one
could tell me what caused it. I’d be
driving my car or swimming, that fear
was always at the back of my mind.”
Needing support, Pam formed an
Australian SCAD survivors’ Facebook
page. As members joined up, sharing
their stories of shattered lives – jobs,
lifestyles, confidence and even homes
lost – Pam longed to offer
them informed reassurance.
“I knew how scared and
isolated I felt and didn’t want
anyone else going through
that. I was really driven to
get research going,” she says.
She sat at her computer
and started typing emails.
Eventually a response pinged
into her inbox. It was from
Professor Graham. He told
her some of the theories
around SCAD but said there
weren’t enough survivors to
conduct a study.
Pam consulted her
members. Then she wrote
back to Professor Graham.
“Wow! Very impressive,”
he replied when he sawhow many were willing to be
involved, and drew up a questionnaire
for an initial study.
Those findings have now helped
obtain a grant of $100,000 which will
go towards a ground-breaking study,
carrying out genomic sequencing on
survivors, looking for preventative »