In 2007, I almost had a heart attack. I had what felt like the muscles in my left arm and the left side of my chest tensing up. I ended up in the hospital and a stress test the following day showed some abnormalities. It turned out, after an angiogram, that I had a coronary artery that was 65-70% blocked.
Due to my inflammatory bowel disease, the cardiologist decided it would be safer to put me on a statin, rather than put in a stent and give me blood thinners. While I was in the hospital, the stress test opened up a healing wound where my GI doc had removed a polyp a few weeks previous, causing a massive bleed and me blacking out just before the scheduled angioplasty.
The GI doc had to go in there the following day and seal up the leaker before the cardiologist could do his thing. Hence the statin rather than the stent.
A year to the day from the first completed angiogram, I had another, and the original blockage was totally gone. I can’t help but think that any other plaque deposits elsewhere were probably gone, as well.