Living with Tuberculosis

On Saturday 27th October 2007 I had a call from a friend and her husband Michael, dear friends from when I lived in the Oxfordshire area. They both sounded fine and were going to a golden wedding anniversary party in the afternoon and the theatre in the evening. Michael asked me to email him on the following Monday with some details of forth coming events at my local folk club. He being a keen musician and teacher of guitar and mandolin.

On Monday morning I had a call from another friend, mutual friends of Michael and his wife. She said she had bad news..Michael had died suddenly, with no warning on Sunday evening. He was literally just sitting watching TV. His wife asked what he would like to eat..not answering, she thought he had fallen asleep. She shook him a little and realised that he wasn’t breathing. 5 or so years before he had developed an irregular heartbeat and was fitted with a pacemaker He had had no significant symptoms since…

The post mortem revealed a virulent strain of tuberculosis around the heart. I am just so shocked and sad that because he was asymptomatic, there was no warning. I have subsequently read that an irregular heart beat could possibly have been an early warning sign of TB, maybe he should never have had a pacemaker fitted. Perhaps a biopsy of the heart membrane should have been taken at the time?

This gentle, gifted man should never have died. I will attend his funeral on Thursday 8ht November 2007.