A 46-year-old woman has opened up about the subtle symptoms she ignored before being hit with a life-threatening heart attack.
Nikki, a TikToker who goes by the handle @martyandnikki, suffered a heart attack in February, despite what she described as "no previous medical conditions" in a video shared on the social media platform.
At first, she thought the strange signs she was experiencing were nothing serious.
It started with a dull pain in her left shoulder, something she assumed was from “sleeping on it wrong” or possibly due to perimenopause. She also had bouts of nausea and chest tightness, but the symptoms came and went. “I thought I was just experiencing indigestion,” she explained.
But while dining out one day, the situation escalated fast. Nikki described feeling “pain radiating” down her arm and said her “chest felt like it was being squeezed as tight as you could squeeze it,” all while feeling intensely sick.
It was then she realized she was having a full-blown heart attack.
In an update video posted on March 8, Nikki recalled her trip to the hospital.
Her EKG results were “a showstopper” and her troponin - which is a protein released when the heart muscle is damaged - was "through the roof”, she said.
Doctors found no signs of blockages, plaque, or clots. Instead, she was treated for a “spasm” with nitroglycerin or “nitro” - a drug used to widen arteries and improve blood flow.
“All labs - cholesterol, lipoprotein, homocysteine, calcium score - they were all normal,” Nikki added. “Echo[cardiogram] (ultrasound of the heart) minorly abnormal - possible broken heart syndrome. Two angio[gram]s (analyzing blood vessels) both good - ‘no damage.’”
Five weeks later, the woman is still navigating her recovery. She admitted to staying “pretty symptomatic for the first few weeks home with some chest pain and some tachycardia (increased heart rate)".
She’s also had “several trips back” to the emergency room, noting that “all” of her EKGs have remained “abnormal” since the incident. Still, she shared that her troponin levels have “come back down to normal".
Frustrated by a lack of clear answers, Nikki took to the comments on her TikTok page and came across a TED Talk from a doctor based in Texas discussing lesser-known heart conditions.
She decided to make an appointment. That decision may have saved her life as the doctor diagnosed her with Prinzmetal - also known as coronary vasospasm.
According to the Cleveland Clinic, “Prinzmetal angina is also called variant angina or vasospastic angina,” and its symptoms include "chest pain episodes that happen during the night when you’re at rest," even when tests show no signs of coronary artery disease.
“[The doctor] explained that I'm still having symptoms because I am not being treated properly for it,” Nikki said. “She took me off two meds that I never even needed in the first place. Added in one that's gonna be necessary for prevention and gave me a really solid plan with Nitro which I will now have to keep on me every minute for the rest of my life.”
The doctor believes Nikki’s heart attack was triggered by “a perfect storm of a recent traumatic event, perimenopause, and a recent illness and it was kind of all at once".
While there doesn’t appear to be a strong genetic factor, the severity of the spasm suggests Nikki may be “more susceptible to future events or future heart attacks.” The nitro, she said, will act as a “rescue med”.
Since starting the new treatment plan, Nikki said she’s gone “two days” without chest pain and feels “better than [she’s] felt in the last month".
“There’s still a lot to do,” she said, “but this is a giant step in a really good direction.”