Heart Ache

摘要

Chloe looked miserable. She was curled up on the hospital bed, sweaty and shaking, wracked with waves of nausea, her heart racing. I gave her a cool washcloth and a basin as the nurse started her Ⅳ. I had cared for her before; though only 16, she'd been in the hospital a dozen times already."I think it may be another heart valve infection," I told her. She nodded, familiar with the diagnosis, and the treatment that followed. She was at particular risk for a type of infection called endocarditis, where bacteria invade and infect the valves of the heart.Chloe was born with an aortic valve that had only two parts, instead of its normal three, and was unusually small and stiff. As she grew older, her valve became thicker and less pliable.