Issaquah man shares near-death experience with COVID-19

It’s not just your lungs that are affected by COVID-19, as it may damage your heart and kidneys as well. That’s what an Issaquah man found out after his near-death experience.

“A lot of my symptoms had to do with the inflammation of my heart and my kidneys,” Michael Pederson told the Gee and Ursula Show.

Local nurse recovers from COVID-19 while her husband fights to stay alive

According to the Washington Post, health care workers in China and New York have reported myocarditis, an inflammation of the heart muscle, and irregular heart rhythms in COVID-19 patients — even in patients with no pre-existing heart conditions.

Kidney damage is also showing as a common symptom reported by COVID-19 patients. Alan Kliger, a nephrologist at the Yale School of Medicine, said early data showed 14 to 30 percent of COVID-19 patients in the intensive care unit in New York and Wuhan, China, lost kidney function and later required dialysis.

Pederson tested positive for the virus on March 17, 2020, one day after his girlfriend learned she had it too. She recovered fairly quickly, but his COVID-19 journey was a lot different.

“I started with fevers that got up to 103 and I would have to take ice baths and hang around naked to get my temperature down. Sometimes, it would take two hours,” he said.

It wasn’t until ten days later that he started coughing. He became so weak that he couldn’t even walk to the bathroom and back.

In addition to checking his temperature, Pederson had been using an oximeter to track his oxygen levels. On March 27, his girlfriend tested his levels while he was sleeping and it was down to the low 80s. She woke him up and took him to the emergency room at Swedish Medical Center in Issaquah where they diagnosed him with pneumonia. He was admitted to the hospital and stayed there for 11 days.

While Pederson was on oxygen, fighting for his life in his hospital room, he reached out to his friends on social media. He said his motivation came from his friend, Ricky, who died several years ago of a respiratory illness. Even though he knew he was going to die, Ricky stayed positive until the very end, always worrying more about others than himself.

Pederson also cited the book “Man’s Search for Meaning,” written by Viktor Frankl, who chronicled his experiences and lessons learned as a prisoner in a Nazi concentration camp during World War II.

“On my worst night, my inflammatory count was way, way up there and they were about to put me on a ventilator, and I started thinking about Ricky and Dr. Frankl,” he said. “Both of them had this passion for thinking past yourself and thinking of other people. I thought … that’s what I need to do … stop worrying about the hospital, accept this situation, and be thankful.”

Pederson is convinced that’s what allowed him to heal.

“I was able to surpass my ego and my thoughts and focus on trying to help others, and that really helped me relax and get past my own issues,” he said.

Be the best version of yourself now and after this outbreak

The Issaquah real estate broker still has to clear his throat frequently. His heart rate is still unusually high, and he will have to undergo more testing to see what damage has been done to his heart. But even after his harrowing experience with COVID-19, he feels very fortunate and wants to share his experience so others know what to expect.

“The more we know, the better off we are,” he said. “I’m very blessed.”

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