“Heparin saved my life”

Andrew Schorr, Patient Power founder 

About three years ago, I would go to the gym everyday and I had a pain in my right leg, and I thought I pulled a muscle, just something at the gym. And it went on another day and another day, and I’d stretch and the pain didn’t go away. And it got worse, and I was worried about my leg.

So there was a phone number I could call to talk to the nurse. So I called the nurse and I described it and I said: “I probably just pulled a muscle”. She said: “I don’t know. I want the doctor to call you”. The doctor called me and I said: “I think I pulled a muscle, don’t you think?”. He said: “I want you to go to the emergency room”. “The emergency room”, I said, “This is not an emergency”. He said: “You need to go to get an ultrasound of your leg to look for a blood clot”.

So I go to the hospital and I tell them what the doctor said on the phone. They do an ultrasound on my right leg and then they do an ultrasound on my left leg. I said: “Why are you doing my left leg?”. She said: “We have to do both”. What did they find? A blood clot in my right calf. My leg was hot, and swollen and hurt. I thought it was a pulled a muscle and it was a blood clot. And then in my left leg I had no pain but above the knee I had a blood clot there too!

In the emergency room they had me take a Heparin medicine explaining trying to control the clot. And then in the hospital, in the room, they would have me get little shots in my belly, little needle. And then when I went home, then I would give myself shots, I think every day, I had to go like this and give myself a little shot. It took thirty seconds, wasn’t a big deal but it made me feel safe.

One of the nurses explained to me in the hospital that if I didn’t work to dissolve the clot, I could have a pulmonary embolism and die. So I was scared, so I was very eager to have the right medicine to save my life.