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Trudy HallSUPPLIED

Trudy Hall was walking her five- and seven-year-old daughters to school with her four-month-old in tow, when she suddenly fainted.

Aged 38 at the time and very athletic, Hall was incredulous when she woke up in the ICU and learned she’d suffered a cardiac arrest. “I couldn’t believe what happened,” she says, “that I had needed to be resuscitated.”

A diagnosis of idiopathic heart failure started a journey to look for answers – and a decline in heart function led Hall to receive a heart transplant six years later. “I had an excellent heart failure team at Toronto General Hospital, which then became my transplant team,” she says. “I was pretty sick; I was given about 48 hours to live if no heart had shown up.”

Hall compares receiving a heart transplant to “winning the lottery” – and was able to go back to work after a year as well as return to skiing, cycling and swimming.

The experience has taken a significant toll on Hall’s family, including her daughters, and she was determined to continue searching for answers. While an initial consultation with a geneticist didn’t provide any conclusive insights, she was asked to return two years after the transplant.

“There are always new genes being discovered,” Hall explains. “When I went back, I was told I had a gene that is predominant in the Dutch population – and that is linked to heart disease.”

While the findings helped to explain what happened, they also heightened her worry that her family might be at risk. “From finding out that something genetic is at play, we discovered that one of my girls has the gene,” she says. “My mom and some of my brothers, sisters and cousins also have it.”

Since Hall has a nursing background, with experience in cardiology as well as various other areas of practice, including home and palliative care, she has seen the far-reaching impact of heart conditions. “About 15 or 20 years ago, palliative care was mostly focused on people with cancer,” she says. “Now, the incidence of deaths due to heart disease is outpacing cancer. That’s why we need to focus on how to support people – and how to recognize earlier signs and symptoms to prevent certain things from happening.”

That’s why she jumped at the chance to participate in the UNEARTH CVD (Using Novel Approaches for the Early Recognition of Transient Ischemic Attack, Heart Failure and Connections with Vascular Dementia) study, led by Dr. Douglas Lee, Ted Rogers Centre for Heart Research at the Peter Munk Cardiac Centre, UHN. Dr. Lee’s project is funded by Heart & Stroke and Brain Canada Foundation, through the Canada Brain Research Fund (CBRF), Brain Canada’s innovative partnership with the Government of Canada, through Health Canada.

“I felt there is definitely a need for this kind of research,” she says, adding that as a nurse, she is trained to look at the whole person instead of focusing on conditions associated with single organs. “Patients with heart conditions and their families are all concerned about potential issues affecting other parts of their bodies, and especially cognitive impairment. In addition to the physical signs for a heart conditions, like swelling of the ankles or shortness of breath, there could be other symptoms, such as people’s memory or mood being affected.”

Observing her mother cope with heart problems made Hall realize that in the elderly, memory issues are often dismissed as related to aging and dementia, when they could be pointing to other health concerns.

“I certainly remember times when I wasn’t feeling 100 per cent, and this did affect my cognition and my emotions,” she says. “It affected my ability to manage things.”

Her personal and professional experiences have served to emphasize that “we need to look at the person as a whole. Not only are our hearts and brains connected – they are having a big impact on our physical, psychological, emotional and spiritual well-being and how we live each day.”


Advertising feature produced by Randall Anthony Communications with Brain Canada and Heart & Stroke. The Globe’s editorial department was not involved.

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