Not enough people know that sitting for long hours in a plane, car, bus, train, or even office chair, they are at risk of suffering from deep vein thrombosis (DVT), also known as a blood clot in the leg. Those who travel a lot may have noticed it but just ignore the problem. Never disregard it or it may end up as a pulmonary embolism (PE), which is fatal.
At least two American leaders – President Richard Nixon and Vice President Dan Quayle – experienced DVT and both never knew it!
On September 26, 1974, The New York Times reported that a piece of blood clot broke off from Nixon’s phlebitis, which damaged his left leg, floated through his heart, and destroyed a dime-sized area in his right lung without causing any chest pain.
The attending physician told the media: “Mr. Nixon now has an embolus (a clot that has moved from the leg into the lung) in the right mid-upper lung field on the lateral surface. This is potentially a dangerous situation but it is not critical at this time.”
On the other hand, Quayle was promoting his memoir, Standing Firm, when he experienced severe shortness of breath and had trouble finishing his speeches. He thought it was just a bad cold and didn’t bother to see a doctor. On November 28, 1994, he was brought to the emergency room at the Indiana University Medical Center. The doctor’s diagnosis: “walking pneumonia.”
Quayle was sent home and thought it was over. The following day, however, his breathing difficulty worsened and was admitted to the emergency room again. After further tests, doctors re-diagnosed his condition as a “pulmonary embolism.”
“You’d be surprised how often a pulmonary embolism is missed even with most skilled physicians,” Quayle said in a statement following his release. “Misdiagnosis is common. I was lucky…very lucky.”
The National Institute of Health said more than 600,000 Americans have PE each year, and more than 60,000 of them die. Experts say that most of those who die do so within 30 to 60 minutes after symptoms start. That’s scary, indeed.
This is also true in most of Asia. “Authorities in Asia, especially governmental organizations, tend to be very conservative and overly cautious about going public regarding health issues like DVT,” says Dr. Walter Fister, whose special interest is on public health and works with the Mount Elizabeth Medical Centre in Singapore.
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