Mike Received a Lifesaving Procedure to Remove a Blood Clot from his Lungs

2/15/2024

At 73, Mike Gotta considered himself a pretty healthy guy. He worked out at the local Y most days, and took pride in staying fit. But all that started to change a few months ago.

“Looking back I should have put two and two together,” said Mike. “I stopped taking my prescription blood thinner a couple years ago, and felt good for a while. Then I slowly started experiencing shortness of breath, and after that, my leg became painful and swollen.”

Mike remembers his son-in-law noticing how easily he became winded when climbing stairs. “I just thought this is what growing old must feel like,’” recalls Mike.

Each day Mike gradually felt worse until it reached its peak on January 4th. That evening he remembers feeling terrible and telling his wife Bitsy that he needed to get to the hospital right away.

“She asked me if I wanted to go Chicago, and I said no, take me to Northwest Health – it’s closer,” said Mike.

Five minutes later Mike was in the emergency department at Northwest Health – Porter. “I told them I had chest pain, severe chest pain – and immediately the doctors and nurses were all over me,” said Mike.

A CT scan was ordered and revealed that Mike had a pulmonary embolism. A large blood clot had traveled from his swollen leg – which was diagnosed as deep vein thrombosis - to his lung and was blocking his right main pulmonary artery.

Mike was immediately taken to the cardiac cath lab, where interventional cardiologist Sandeep Sehgal, MD, FACC, performed a pulmonary thrombectomy – a minimally invasive catheter-guided procedure to remove the blood clot from his pulmonary artery.

“They figured it out in a New York minute. These guys were all on the dot,” said Mike. “Everything happened really quickly. I feel so fortunate that I had a bunch of people who knew what they were doing.”

After the procedure, Mike was taken to ICU, where again he applauds all of his caregivers. “The doctors, nurses, technicians – all were amazing,” said Mike. “They took their time, explained things to me – which I really appreciated. I felt each of them really cared.”

Mike was discharged the next day and is back on anticoagulation medicine. He recently returned to Northwest Medical Group to follow-up with Dr. Sehgal, which he describes as another great experience, and wishes to share his story and express his “big hearty thank you” to everyone involved in his care.

“Everyone was just off-the-charts nice to me. It’s a very good culture at Northwest Health and really impressive,” said Mike. “That’s why I called the CEO, Dr. James Leonard. In this world of change and negativity, I wanted to let him know what a positive experience I had. And to say thank you – without exception! Everyone was absolutely awesome!”

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