100 AWW.COM.AU AUGUST 2017
PHOTOGRAPH SUPPLIED AND USED WITH PERMISSION.Sharon and
Brett Kelly
with sons
William (left)
and James,
who was
born just 10
days before
her attack.“The treatment is to let the tear heal
itself, says Professor Graham. ”
medications, and even, if sufficient
funds come in, investigating drugs
that will alter the functional defect.
At present the treatment is to let
the tear heal itself, says Professor
Graham. In cases where doctors
fear blood flow to the heart is
about to stop all together, they
insert a stent, but that can make
things worse and extend the tear.
As word has spread, the study
has recruited hundreds of case
studies, with more signing up at
the rate of one a week.
“These women just want to
know: Why is my life not the
same? What are the chances of
having it again? Will my daughters
have it?’ says Professor Graham.
Sharon Kelly,
Age 41
Among those who will join the study
is Sharon Kelly. She had her SCAD
attack in December last year, 10 days
after giving birth. Sharon’s first baby
had tragically died shortly after birth.
To now have two healthy sons was
a dream come true. “I felt awesome.
I was in such a good space for the first
time in a really, really long time,” she
says and breaks down: “And then this
shit happened.”
Sharon’s attack happened in the
middle of the night. She was woken at
1am by a pressure pain in her chest.
“It must be indigestion,” she told
herself. But after vomiting and
realising the pain was spreading to her
jaw and left arm, she woke her
husband, Brett. He immediately called
for an ambulance.
Sharon, more concerned with the
newborn photo shoot she’d booked
for the next day, admits: “I thought
he was being melodramatic.” When
doctors at Sutherland Hospital in
Sydney told her she’d suffered a heart
attack due to SCAD, she exclaimed:
“But I’m only 41. This doesn’t happen
to people my age. How did I go from
There’s no explanation other than
the fact I was postpartum.”
Liza, too, will join the Victor Chang
study. She’s been diagnosed with
having FMD (fibromuscular
dysplasia), a disease of the blood
vessels that usually affects arteries to
the brain and kidneys but has been
found in several SCAD survivors.
(Eight years previously, she’d suffered
a dissected artery in her neck.)
The stress of looking for a new
home was also affecting her, and
irregular periods signalled a hormonal
upset – all possible contributory
factors. “My grandmother’s history is
similar to mine. She had lots of heart
attacks and strokes,” Liza says. “I’d
love to know if there’s a genetic link
because I have a daughter and SCAD
seems to affect mostly females.
“I’d like more awareness of SCAD.
TV shows men having heart attacks,
never young, fit, healthy women.
I didn’t think in a million years
I was having a heart attack.” AW WSCAD survivors who would like to enrol in
Victor Chang’s research, or anyone
wishing to make donations to research,
should email: [email protected].recovering from a C-section to
recovering from a heart attack? How
did I go from waking up with a sore
chest to being admitted to hospital
with a torn coronary artery?”
Desperate to get back to her baby
and Christmas shopping, she was
released five days later. That night she
was back in hospital after a second
heart attack.
“I still wanted to go home but the
cardiologist was very frank. ‘Sharon,
we can’t send you home. We can’t
have you dropping dead in front of
your children’.”
Today, Sharon’s plans for getting
a personal trainer and using her
maternity leave “kicking it” have been
replaced by physio in a cardio unit.
“But I’m glad to have this rehab. You
lose a lot of confidence after
something like this. I need to know if
it’s safe for me to walk up a hill or
pick up my toddler. A lot of things
make you really nervous. Even feeding
my baby made me nervous at first.”
Sharon tells herself that at some
point her medications will decrease
and she’ll feel better. “But I do feel
angry, I can’t think why this happened
to me. I was asleep, for God’s sake!HEART “
FAC T