Cardiologist summits Mount Everest in just 3 weeks

In 2013, Qaisra Saeed, MD, never dreamed of climbing a mountain. But one day in a kickboxing class, a friend mentioned that climbing Kilimanjaro, the highest mountain in Africa, had been on her bucket list.

The woman was trying to gather a group of friends to try the feat, and Syed, 51, finally agreed.

“It was an amazing experience,” Syed told MedPage Today . “We did it in a week .”

Perhaps fortunately, Saeed, an interventional cardiologist at RWJBarnabas Health in New Jersey, discovered a hidden advantage. She was the only person in the group who did not suffer from altitude sickness.

Since then, Saeed’s climbing experience has grown. “Every year or two, I think, ‘Let me do something,'” she said of her ever-expanding list of tops. Mount Everest, the highest mountain in the world, straddles the border between Nepal and China. For those who climb, “Everest is always on your radar,” Syed said. It’s “always the ultimate climb.”

At 29,032 feet, Everest could take her 2 to 3 months, just like the average climber. Syed questioned how she could stay away from her patients for so long. Taking more than a few weeks off for a climb is out of the question, she said, noting that she has a separate cardiology practice and that she is on call for emergencies.

“I could ‘don’t say, ‘Goodbye, I’ll be back in 2 months,'” she joked.

COVID-19 The pandemic has stalled her original plans for 2020. Meanwhile, she went on to say

Last year, Saeed climbed the 26,000-foot Manaslu in Nepal. A Nepali guide from a mountaineering company told her that, depending on her altitude tolerance, she might be able to climb Mount Everest in 3 weeks.

She started researching Everest of people climbed Mount Everest in a few weeks — what food did they eat, what training did they do, and what was their schedule.

“In January, I finally decided that I was going to This attempt,” said Saeed.

Her strict pre-climb schedule included waking up at least an hour before work and carrying a 50-pound backpack. Then she would go to work and go to work at night Taekwondo class. After class, she sometimes does another run or other cardio. She also eats a very strict diet with minimal carbs.

When it comes to bed, Saeed Sleeping in a hypoxic tent to make sure her body is ready for the plateau. She was eventually able to set her tent to 20,000 feet of oxygen, with a caveat – daytime training becomes more difficult, Because at that altitude the human body is naturally very tired.

But when she set off for Everest, she was ready, Said said. She told herself that she would Push as much as is reasonably possible.

When she reached base camp, she participated in a traditional ceremony where climbers asked the mountain for permission to climb. She started climbing that night.

She climbed to Camp 1 and then to Camp 2, where she was supposed to rest for a few days. However, with the storm coming, rest days would greatly increase her schedule Deviated so that she didn’t have a good day to summit. So, she kept going.

When Syed reached Camp IV, the last camp before the summit , she has no days off, her guide insists she take a day off to make sure she doesn’t walk too slowly to complete the journey.

Camp 4, 26,000 feet, wind It’s huge and most people get extremely cold or extremely hot there. But Syed says it’s her favorite camp. Dressed in hiking suits and cramming four people into a tent, she says she slept the best she’d ever slept. Good afternoon nap.

After the break, Said and her guide, a young man in his late 20s who had summited Mount Everest several times, and a 19-year-old year old man undergoing instructional training Training – Syed left camp early because he was a little slower on his way to Camp IV.

The goal is to reach the summit around 4:00 or 5:00 in the morning and watch the sun rise over the summit. But Syed and her guide reached the top at 11:45 that night. They could have retreated and returned again, but Syed insisted she wanted to summit then and there.

In the end, “it was awesome,” she said. “We did the whole summit alone.”

“We sat there for a while and took pictures and videos,” she added. “It was awesome…they told me it was really cold, but I didn’t feel it at all.”

After achieving this noble feat in 3 weeks, the game Ede said she was more daring, especially when it came to her chosen career in medicine. “If I get a call in the middle of the night…it’s not intimidating,” she noted. “It just gave me more confidence…I felt like I could do anything.”

When she talks to patients about their activity and exercise levels, this The benefits will gradually seep into them.

“Overall, managing life is easier,” she said.

Syed is now targeting K2 in Pakistan – Pakistan’s second highest mountain in the world – and there may be some milder ascents in the fall before that.

She hopes her fast-paced Everest ascent will inspire others who may not believe they can do it a little bit outside their comfort zone.

“You just have to hold on,” she said. “Sometimes you have an opportunity to do something, and if you didn’t take that opportunity at the time, you probably wouldn’t get that opportunity again.”

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  Jennifer Henderson in 2021 Joined MedPage Today in January as a business and survey writer. She has covered the healthcare industry, life sciences and legal practice in New York City.