I’m Aware That I’m Rare: Mary Hale (366)

The phaware® interview

Pulmonary hypertension patient, Mary Hale discusses the power of positivity in life post PAH diagnosis.

My name is Mary Hale, and I’m from Ohio. I was diagnosed in February, 2010. I had open heart surgery in January of 2010. So once I went through all the testing, then I had a diagnosis. I had PAH. I had a pain in my side, and thought pulled a muscle at work, and I was just babying it, and I finally went to the doctor. They did all this stuff. It didn’t look good. I went for a heart catheterization, and they kept me, and I had open heart surgery January 25th, Monday morning, 2010. I remember it plain as day. They couldn’t believe I was still alive. I was dumbfounded, because I had no clue what it was. They didn’t even know what it was. The lung specialist that was brought in during the surgery, explained to me that he thought I had PAH. I’m like, “What is that?” So he said to me, “It affects the right side of your heart. It’s the pulmonary artery. It affects your breathing.” So he sent me to a specialist at OSU. I did all those tests, and that’s when I was…