On a Sunday in late January, Brian McGraw of Tupelo returned from a trip to Orlando, Florida, and settled back into his routine. 

Brian, who works in the cardiac medical device industry, has spent the last 23 years working alongside North Mississippi Medical Center’s heart specialists and is well versed in the signs of heart disease. 

That Wednesday, Brian noticed “a fullness in my chest, like when you’re running or working out in the cold, but no pain. It was like that cold air in your lungs feeling.” 

At 2 a.m. Thursday, Brian awoke with “an overwhelming sense of impending doom… like the rapture happened and I’m the only one left behind,” he recalled. He paced the floor for two hours, unable to shake the feeling—trying to get settled and not disturb his family.

Convinced he might have caught a virus on his flight, Brian planned to visit Med Serve later that day.

Around sunrise, still unable to sleep, he checked his heart rhythm using a mobile cardiac device he had bought on Amazon. “I put my fingers on the device and checked the EKG at 7 a.m. just to make sure everything still looked normal,” he says, “and it did.” 

The Heart Attack Strikes

Shortly after that normal reading, Brian decided to do his own version of an exercise stress test – he pushed their garbage can down the hill about 100 yards and ran back up.

That’s when it happened. “As soon as I ran back up to our front door, it hit me,” Brian says. “I broke out in a full sweat. I felt absolutely crushing chest pain and pain between my shoulder blades. It felt like somebody had taken my heart and wrung it out like a cloth. It’s an undeniable feeling. Immediately, I started sweating, my heart was racing, and I was short of breath.” 

Looking back, Brian believes his restlessness was his body’s way of warning him.

Their doorbell camera captured the episode, which alerted his wife, Posey. He checked his heart rhythm again, and this time “the EKG was remarkably changed,” he says. “I knew what was happening—I was having a heart attack.” 

They knew they had to get to the hospital immediately.

Racing Against Time

Brian was experiencing a widowmaker heart attack, a life-threatening blockage in the left anterior descending artery that supplies blood to the heart. Without immediate treatment, the damage could be deadly.

The ER team sprang into action, sending him straight to the Cath Lab. Interventional cardiologist Dr. Benjamin Blossom inserted a catheter into the blocked artery, inflated a balloon to open the blockage and placed a stent to keep the artery open.

“I’m just so grateful I was here. It’s amazing to have this level of care, this close to home,” Brian says. “When it comes to your heart, time is muscle. The more time that lapses, the more heart muscle you lose.”

A New Lease on Life

Brian’s heart attack surprised everyone. At 52, he had no prior heart disease, normal cholesterol and an active lifestyle. But swift action and an experienced heart team made all the difference.

“People need to know, you don’t sit on this,” he urges. “Get to the hospital! Don’t try to be a hero—just don’t wait.”

He doesn’t take this second chance lightly. “I’ve changed my diet and lost 35 pounds,” he says. “I’m running about four and a half miles a day. I feel really, really good.”

And Brian is grateful: “What they did for me, I’ll never forget. Because North Mississippi Health Services treated me like family, I was able to go home one day after having a major heart attack to spend my life with my family.”