Can anyone provide any insight please?!
Hi everyone, has anyone had ANYTHING like this??
I’m 33 and had open heart surgery in June 2024 for PAPVR and ASD repair. About a month later I started getting these flares that have now happened around 6 times where my neck feels tight when I inhale or bend forward, and I get this weird pulsing sensation in my neck when I change positions like sitting to standing, along with chest aching and pressure that’s worse with breathing or bearing down and upper back tightness. The whole thing lasts about 5 days, then completely goes away and I feel normal again between flares. I’ve had multiple EKGs, two holters, six echos, two CT scans, and a cardiac MRI, and everything is normal except my CRP, which goes up to around 17 to 25 during flares and then goes back to totally normal like 0.5 after. My doctors are hesitant to call it pericarditis or give me colchicine and want me to come in during a flare for testing, which I understand, but it’s frustrating because the pattern feels inflammatory. I’m wondering if anyone has experienced something like this with CRP spiking then normalizing and symptoms like this, and if this sounds like post pericardiotomy syndrome or something else.