Everyone loves the miracle story. Hospice. No options left. Then a clinical trial. Then a second chance. For me, that second chance came through the early feasibility study of the EVOQUE transcatheter tricuspid valve replacement. I later continued follow-up as part of the TRISCEND II research studying this therapy for people living with severe tricuspid regurgitation, But what people don’t talk about very often is what happens after the miracle. When the swelling finally s

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. But when you live with heart valve disease, one medical note can explain years of symptoms. For a long time, I felt my body changing. I was tired all the time. My chest felt heavy. The swelling kept getting worse. But the focus stayed on my past surgeries and my pulmonary arteries. Meanwhile, something else was quietly progressing, severe tricuspid regurgitation. My echocardiograms showed moderate leakage in 2005. By 2014, it was

Tricuspid Valve Regurgitation, Explained in Plain Language I’m listening to a non-invasive cardiologist  explain tricuspid valve regurgitation (TR)  grades, and I hear this a lot: “Mild” and “trace” are clinically irrelevant.They don’t matter. I understand what that means medically .But here’s the truth — it still matters to patients. Let me explain why 👇 🩺 What Doctors Are Taught In medical training and guidelines: Trace or mild TR is very common Many healthy people have i

Why awareness, earlier answers, and patient voices matter in carcinoid heart disease and valve care ✨ What I Learned Today I love sharing the things I learn along the way, especially when it’s something I wish patients were told sooner. Today’s lesson? How some rare cancers can damage the heart long before anyone realizes what’s happening and why this matters more than people think! Some rare cancers, like carcinoid tumors, can release too much serotonin into the bloodstream.