NHL great Howie Meeker skated from a death sentence to a new lease on life with the help of a Victoria cardiac specialist and a $1.75-million piece of equipment.
Now Meeker is telling his story to help the Victoria Hospitals Foundation raise money to pay for that equipment.
“It was a wonderful ride. I met wonderful physicians and our medical system really is unmatched. No one else in the world is looked after any better,” said Meeker from his waterfront home in French Creek.
When Meeker was 16, his unhealthy heart was detected during a physical exam, so he was denied entry into the Royal Canadian Air Force. He got into the army, however, and served three years.
The diagnosis didn’t stop him from playing sports, becoming an NHL star with his name on the Stanley Cup four times. The Order of Canada recipient is also a former Progressive Conservative MP and was a colour commentator on Hockey Night in Canada broadcasts.
Meeker, now 94, was dealing with another procedure when he was diagnosed with aortic stenosis. It’s a condition caused by normal wear and tear of heart valves and causes the heart to work harder to pump blood due to calcium deposits in the valves.
The result is chest pain or angina, laboured breathing, bouts of unconsciousness and possibly a heart attack. Untreated patients have a life expectancy of about two years.
Medication helps but does not reverse the damage. In Meeker’s case, open-heart valve surgery was not an option because of his age.
“They said there’s a solution but it’s very rare and it’s very new, and the best group of doctors in that treatment in all of Canada was right down in Victoria at Royal Jubilee Hospital,” said Meeker.
A meeting with interventional cardiologist Dr. Anthony Della Siega, 49, at Royal Jubilee Hospital cardiac centre, changed Meeker’s fate.
Della Siega knew a procedure called TAVI (transcatheter aortic valve implantation) was the answer.
TAVI allows cardiologists to access the heart through a small incision, such as in the patient’s leg. A catheter is threaded through the artery until it reaches the diseased valve.
The catheter is guided precisely to avoid perforation of the artery. This is controlled by what Della Siega said is “paramount to what I do” — a C-arm, a c-shaped piece of equipment that wraps in a semi-circle around a patient, yielding live, high-definition, X-ray-like images of the heart and blood vessels.
The X-ray that is passed through the body results in an image that is transmitted to a monitor so the movement of a body part, an instrument or dye can be seen in detail.
These images show the location and size of any blockage in or near the heart and help specialists determine the best approach, said Della Siega.
Della Siega uses foot pedals to facilitate continuous imaging or to record the image.
In Meeker’s case, when the catheter was stable, a new biological valve was inserted through it.
This life-saving procedure can be performed in an hour or less without general anesthetic, said Della Siega. After it’s inserted, the new biomedical valve works within moments and allows blood to once again flow freely throughout the body.
“Both sides of my heart are pumping equally now; it was a wonderful experience by a courageous bunch of people,” said Meeker.
Before the C-arm made such precise guidance possible, open-heart surgery would have been needed to replace the valve.
The C-arm is also used in angioplasties, angiograms, stent insertions and, in some cases, cardiac biopsies, said Della Siega.
As part of its Cardiac Care Campaign, the Victoria Hospitals Foundation is hoping to raise $3.2 million for 34 pieces of specialized cardiac care equipment.
The most expensive piece of equipment to be funded this year is the $1.75-million C-arm.
A 10-year-old version was replaced about two months ago, and now the foundation needs to pay for it.
“With the aid of the Victoria Hospitals Foundation, it allows us to get this equipment in a timely fashion when we need it to have the best equipment to do our job the best we can,” said Della Siega.
Meeker said he was pleased to meet the cardiac specialist, and Della Siega said he was pleased to again meet the man who coached him in a hockey camp 40 years ago.
“He’s a wonderful man.”
• Contributions to the Cardiac Care Campaign can be made online at victoriahf.ca, by calling 250-519-1750 or by mailing a donation to Wilson Block, 1952 Bay St., Victoria B.C. V8R 1J8.
