Jimmy Walrond’s gratitude toward Dr. Thomas Taylor comes straight from the heart. “This past December, I started having a terrible ache in my side,” Jimmy explains. “I thought it might be kidney stones, and I told Janice, my wife, to take me to the ER at Macon Community Hospital.”

When Dr. Thomas Taylor, a board-certified surgeon with Macon Community Hospital, examined Miles, he determined that Jimmy’s gallbladder was the cause of his pain. But Dr. Taylor also noticed something else when he checked Jimmy’s heart: a skipping sound. Dr. Taylor suspected it might be AFib, also known as atrial fibrillation, an abnormal heart rhythm in which the upper chambers of the heart beat rapidly and chaotically.

Dr. Taylor set up an appointment with Dr. Jung Lee, a board-certified cardiologist affiliated with Macon Community Hospital, who performed an EKG and a stress test.

“I failed the test,” Jimmy says. An arteriogram revealed a blockage that required two stents.

Since then, Jimmy has participated in an 18-week cardiac rehab program at Macon Community Hospital. “I go twice a week and the staff is great,” Jimmy says. “I could not ask for better people. I’m just so grateful Dr. Taylor found the problem before it was too late.”