On May 23, 2023, Father Charles Gallagher was on Nantucket, filling in for a vacationing pastor and saying Mass at St. Mary, Our Lady of the Isle Catholic Church, which he had attended as a boy. He was leading about 400 parishioners in reciting the Nicene Creed, a statement of faith for Roman Catholics, when he became dizzy. His heart was racing, and he thought he might faint. 

“What I didn’t know was I was having severe cardiac arrhythmia,” an irregular and racing heartbeat he said. Worried that he might collapse at the altar, he ended Mass as quickly as he could. 

Afterwards a friend drove him to the hospital, beginning a months-long ordeal that would end with successful treatment at Charlton Memorial Hospital, home to the Southcoast Health Heart & Vascular program.  

At first, doctors in Nantucket found Fr. Gallagher’s heart was beating at 250 beats per minute. They inserted an IV and gave him drugs to slow his heart and prescribed medication used to treat chest pains and high blood pressure — and in his case, atrial fibrillation. 

Over the next six weeks, he endured a series of episodes which landed him repeatedly in the emergency rooms of two or three Boston hospitals. Atrial fibrillation, however, was only part of the problem, and it was not what was sending him to the emergency room regularly. It would take a consultation with doctors at Charlton Memorial Hospital to identify and successfully treat his condition. 

Exactly two months after the first episode on Nantucket, Fr. Gallagher was officiating at a wedding in Plymouth. Once again, his heart started racing, and he was back in the emergency room in Plymouth. 

“I did a grand tour of the ERs of Boston and Cape Cod that summer,” he said. 

The next day, he consulted with Southcoast Health cardiologist Dr. Mark Desnoyers, who agreed to see him right away. Dr. Desnoyers examined him and told him he needed to be in the hospital. 

“He squeezed me in for an office visit right away after all the other cardiologists said they could not see me for three months. He was terrific,” Fr. Gallagher said. 

He was taken by ambulance to Charlton Memorial Hospital, where the attending physician immediately contacted Dr. Nitesh Sood, cardiac electrophysiologist and the Director of the Atrial Fibrillation Wellness Program at Southcoast Health. 

“Dr. Sood was the only one who recognized that there were two separate issues, atrial fibrillation and an atrial flutter, and the flutter was what was sending me to the ER,” Fr. Gallagher said. “He was able to see what was going on through all the noise.” 

An atrial flutter is caused by an electrical short circuit in the heart and can result in a heartbeat as high as 300 beats per minute. Dr. Sood explained he would need two separate procedures. First, they would need to address the atrial flutter, then schedule a separate procedure to address the atrial fibrillation. 

Fr. Gallagher’s first procedure, an atrial flutter ablation, was performed on July 23, 2023. He was discharged home the following day never to have seen another emergency room again for his arrhythmia. In fact, this was performed on a Friday evening and the entire EP lab nursing staff and the anesthesia team stayed afterhours, so he did not have to spend the entire weekend in the hospital on medications to control his rhythm.  

On Nov. 17, Dr. Sood did a second cryoablation to treat the cardiac arrhythmia. Cryoablation is a minimally invasive procedure where a tiny catheter is threaded to the heart, and a small balloon is inflated near the upper chamber. Then extreme cold injected to the area freezes the heart cells that cause an irregular heartbeat. 

“When he did the second ablation it was like an instantaneous return to health,” Fr. Gallagher said. “The blood returned to my face and my extremities, and I had the feeling of immediately having my full health restored.” 

The entire experience with the Southcoast Health cardiologists and care team was excellent. 

“Southcoast Health Heart & Vascular was absolutely tremendous,” he said, and he has now moved all his medical care to Southcoast Health. 

“I’ve had my debrief with Dr. Sood and in about five months he will decide if I even need to be on the bare minimum heart medicine,” he remarked. 

Fr. Gallagher says he has fully recovered and is spending the year teaching and writing about espionage and terrorism at Marquette University, also a Jesuit-run institution. 

He has made some changes in the interest of staying well, exercising a half hour each day and losing some weight. 

“I am grateful to have my full health restored,” he said.  

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