Heartfelt Perfusionist Story

Members of Chili Lounge (left to right) Stephen Dickie, perfusionist; vocalist Cindy Mamchur and Dr. Stephen Korkola, cardiac surgeon, rehearse for The Way to a Girl's Heart, a Prairie Cardiac Foundation event.
Photograph by: Roy Antal, Leader-Post, Leader-Post

ARTICLE REPRINTED.

And the beat goes on.
Bypass surgery, performed by Dr. Stephen Korkola in 2007, saved vocalist Cindy Mamchur's life. As the Regina woman grappled with post-operative pain and the fear of dying, her long-time love of music became her lifeline.

"After I had my heart surgery, the pain was quite incredible and my breathing wasn't as good -- I think that's partly because your sternum has been cracked," she says. "I had a problem staying hunched over because that was just the most comfortable position for me. But then you're putting pressure on your lungs so you feel like you can't breathe."

After she'd been home for a couple of weeks, Cindy went to her music room and started singing.
"I did that every day and my chest didn't hurt as much, so I picked up the guitar," she says. "The music helped with straightening up, with the breathing and with stress and the pain. When I sing, I don't think of anything else. Nothing. That was probably my best pain relief."

Singing also calmed her anxious mind.

"After I had my heart attack I was suffering huge anxiety attacks. I think it's because the heart is the centre of your being. It's what keeps you alive ... When you go to bed at night, you think, 'Am I going to wake up or am I going to have a massive heart attack in my sleep?' "

After Korkola performed the bypass surgery, Cindy no longer felt anxious.

"He's literally touched my heart," Cindy says of Korkola. "That blows me away ... He's seen what's going on there and he's fixed what he's had to fix. Not to say that I won't have to be done again in the future -- there's always that possibility."

After her post-surgical checkup with the cardiac surgeon, she didn't expect to see him again.
But music played a role in connecting the patient and physician and in making another heart connection -- this time with perfusionist Stephen Dickie -- a highly trained specialist who operates the heart-lung machine while a surgeon operates on the heart.

To keep her heart healthy, Cindy takes part in the cardiac rehabilitation and risk reduction services at the Dr. Paul Schwann Applied Health and Research Centre at the University of Regina. Her husband, Grant, is a perfusionist who regularly works with Korkola in the operating room.

The Paul Schwann centre was having a Christmas party and looking for someone to play some songs, Korkola recalls. "Grant knew that I was starting to play guitar and they've known (Dickie) for quite a while and knew he was playing guitar, so Cindy just said, 'Would anybody be interested in playing for the Christmas party?' "

The trio got together and practised a few songs for the party and the band Chili Lounge was launched. It was the first of several gigs the band has played.

"We aren't a band that travels around the country and are rock stars," Korkola says laughing. "We select things that we're going to do and then we practise for them."

The band's next performance will be at "The Way to a Girl's Heart" -- an educational event on heart health being hosted by the Prairie Cardiac Foundation on June 12.

"We're getting involved because we all have a connection to the heart," says Cindy. "This cause is very important to us. It's a lot of work, but it's work that we like. We're doing about 35 songs for this event."

Balancing a demanding career, a busy family life and practice sessions is tricky, Korkola says.
But, like Cindy, the heart surgeon finds that music is a stressbuster.

"It's totally different from my stressful job," Korkola says. "I look forward to doing it a lot. I played a little bit in high school, but then didn't do it for years and years and years. I just started up the last three or four years. It makes a huge difference in terms of being able to get through a difficult day. And my kids are interested in it, so it's something we can do as a family too."
Playing in a band also shows the public that health-care professionals have interests outside hospital walls.

"And it's fun!" Korkola says.

The group performs "pop lounge" music that covers a wide variety of artists -- from The Doors to Eric Clapton, Van Morrison, REM and Talking Heads.

"We pick recognizable songs and then we put our own twist on them," Cindy says.
She believes the key to the group's professional sound is hard work.

"Both of my guitarists are really talented," she says.

Finding time to practise together is hit and miss -- depending on call schedules, says Dickie.
"Sometimes it's very difficult and it requires the patience of your respective spouses," he says. "It is challenging, but you can do it if you really want to."

To prepare for playing at the Prairie Cardiac Foundation event, the trio tries to get together once or twice a week.

"Doing what we do, it's nice to give back to the community," Dickie says.

"And a lot of our patients benefit from this event and the awareness that goes with it. It's a likely fit for us."

Noting Cindy's difficulty in getting diagnosed, Korkola echoes the need to raise awareness about who can be affected by heart disease.

Heart disease kills more Canadian women than any other disease, but like most women, Cindy was unaware she was at risk because she didn't fit the profile of a "typical" heart patient.
Cindy was 43 when she suffered a heart attack in 2000. She had eaten healthy, exercised regularly, wasn't overweight and her family had no history of heart disease.

When she ran out of breath while hiking with her husband, they both attributed her breathlessness to smoking. But when her arm "felt funny" and she began getting jaw pain, she went to the emergency room at the hospital in St. John's, Nfld., where the couple lived at the time.

The ER staff didn't recognize the signs that Cindy was having a heart attack.
"It felt like I had really, really bad heartburn, but it was more than that -- something wasn't right," she recalls. "When I went to the ER, (the doctor) said, 'You have anxiety. I suggest you go home and have a drink.'

"The next day, I went back again. They listened to my chest and they said, 'Your chest sounds a little bit congested, it's probably asthma.' And they gave me an inhaler. The inhaler just made it worse because it raised my heart rate. I couldn't even lay down because it just felt like somebody was choking me."

In desperation, Cindy went back to the hospital for a third time.

"I said, 'Somebody has to help me. I feel like I have an elephant on my chest.' "

Shortly after an ECG was done, a cardiologist came to her bedside and asked, 'Why didn't you get here sooner? You've had a heart attack within the last three days.' And I said, 'I've been here every day for three days.' He didn't say a word."

Cindy says health-care professionals and the public must understand that heart failure is not just a man's disease.

Looking back at her lifestyle, she recognizes there were warning signs.

"Unfortunately, I was a smoker and I was also a Type A personality -- I think that was a deadly combination," she says. "Not only that, but both my parents smoked so I grew up in a house full of smokers. We were at that age when smoking was cool ... I quit the day I had my heart attack. My cardiologist said, 'You've had your last cigarette, haven't you?' And I said, 'I'll never smoke another day in my life.' And I never did."

After her heart attack, a stent was put in, but Cindy continued to have intermittent chest pain.
It wasn't until the couple moved to Regina and Cindy had an angiogram at the General Hospital that it was discovered she had a blockage behind her heart.

"At that time, the General Hospital had a 3-D imager and they picked it up with that," she says. "In Newfoundland, they didn't have that technology. I would say that technology saved my life."
Cindy's husband, Grant, is co-chairing the heart health gala with Regina cardiologist Dr. Andrea Lavoie.

"Historically, women's heart health has been poorly diagnosed," Grant says. "It is a disease that strikes at any age. It used to be thought of as a man's disease, but that's just not true. There have been many mistakes in emergencies over the years and we're trying to correct that."
The fledging foundation also aims to benefit the people of the province.

For example, Grant says the Paul Schwann centre sorely lacks equipment, trained personnel -- such as kinesiologists -- and needs more programs to rehabilitate cardiac patients.
"Even the blood pressure cuffs are ancient," Grant says.

Beginning at 7 p.m. on June 12 at Innovation Place, the gala evening will include entertainment by Chili Lounge and the Youth Ballet & Contemporary Dance of Saskatchewan, a silent and live auction and a fashion show. Tickets are $75 and available at the Rider Store at Mosaic Stadium and the Northgate Mall, Bach & Beyond at the Golden Mile Shopping Centre and Crocus & Ivy.
"A lot of local designers have contributed dresses and the Heart and Stroke Foundation from Toronto sent us a couple of dresses that will be displayed," Grant says.

A variety of "heartfelt" experiences will be auctioned off -- including a green-and-white package that's sure to be a crowd pleaser.

"You can bid on a package where you stand at centre field for "O Canada" for one of the Rider games," Grant says. "You sit with Ken Miller's wife in the stands and then you get to go for dinner and wine tasting with them at Earl's."

Grant credits the community for its tremendous support of the event.

"It's going to be fantastic. We want to make it the go-to evening of the year. We're going to have a really good party."

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