HR Monitor

I'm just curious, is it a good idea to use a HR monitor for the first few weeks after having a pacemaker implanted? My thought is that it will help me to see exactly what my hart rate is when doing different activities, in order to provide more information at the checkup incase I need adjusments.
I just got mine implanted 3 days ago.

6 Comments

no

by Tracey_E - 2009-10-19 09:10:23

I would suggest not using one. It makes it too easy to obsess over what you're heart's doing rather than trust the pm and get on with your life. Try to resist the urge to count your pulse all the time, also, only do it if you feel odd. If you feel good with exercise, your heart is getting high enough and your pm is doing its job. If you have symptoms, just tell them about it and make a note of when it happens so they can check the report and see what happened.

You may find that a hrm won't even work. A few members here have found ones that work but most of us either can't get one to work at all, or can't get it to work accurately. I can't get any reading at all, my pm interferes with the signal and it says I have no pulse. Others have the opposite problem, it picks up the pm spikes as well as the beats so the number it gives you is too high.

Heart Rate Monitor

by SMITTY - 2009-10-19 11:10:04

Hell Breyer,

I take it you may be new to our litle corner of the world so WELCOME.

I agree, for what that's worth, with Tracey about the heart monitor. I'm afraid if you get one you may end up trying to micro manage your pacemaker, or expecting the people doing the checkup to do something of that nature. Now if I haven't already offended you and stopped you from reading, please let me try to explain a little more.

Your pacemaker has low and high points and only helps your heart out when necessary. Necessary is when your natural heart rate drops below the low setting (most of these are in the 60 - 70 range) does your pacemaker come in and help maintain at least that low rate. The pacemaker will continue to monitor your heart beat, helping as necessary (this help may be only a few percent of the time) until your heart rate goes above the high set point and at that time the PM sits on the sideline just monitoring your heart beat. It will do nothing until your heart rate drops back below that high set point.

So having a heart monitor may or may not tell you anything about what your pacemaker is doing. Most pacemakers do record how much they help the heart and why and this information is downloaded during the checkup so they will know what has gone on.

I'm sure you have seen the Greyhound Bus commercial where they say "leave the driving to us," well if I may make a suggestion sit back and leave helping maintain your heart beat to the pacemaker. It will not fail you and it can relieve you of much anxiety.

One more word, you have a new pacemaker which means you will be more aware of what you heart beat is doing than ever before, so don't let it take over your life. Of course if you think you have a problem call you doctor, but the need for such calls are seldom necessary.

Good luck,

Smitty

OK

by Breyer - 2009-10-20 01:10:58

Thanks for the responses. I was concerned because they only set my upper rate to 110bpm. I wanted to know if it is constantly maxing out at 110bpm, then I might ask to have it increased.

I'm sure you're both right, though. I guess I will feel if it is not enough for my activity level - if I get the dizziness or light headed again, I'll contact my dr. right away.

limits

by Tracey_E - 2009-10-20 08:10:20

110 is pretty low for an upper limit. Why do you have the pm? For some conditions, it doesn't really matter what your upper limit is, it depends how you use the pm. They should be able to tell when they do the interrogation how often you're bumping your upper limit.

Depends

by ElectricFrank - 2009-10-21 01:10:19

It depends on your nature. I monitor all sorts of aspects of my physiology and don't obsess over it. In fact I feel better knowing what is happening. If I was going to die tomorrow morning and there was a way to know I would want to have the information.

With the upper limit set so low it is even more important to monitor your HR during exercise. I won't go into all the technical details, but the bottom line is that if you hit the upper limit your HR doesn't just level off at the setting. It starts skipping beats such that the average is limited in your case to 110. In fact it may actually jump down to something like 90. At this point while your body is needing increased blood flow to support the activity level, your heart is giving it less. It feels lousy and you may find yourself short of breath. With a HR monitor you can limit exercise to a HR of 110.

Also, unless you have some serious heart condition that demands such a low limit there is no reason to have it set so low. After my implant I discovered that mine was set to 120. I didn't wait for a 3 month checkup, but instead called for an appt and asked that mine be set to 150. It took some insisting to get it set to 140. At the next checkup I insisted and got 150. By the way I'm 79 yrs.

I also had the lower rate dropped from 70 down to 55.

frank

I use mine all the time.

by COBradyBunch - 2009-10-21 06:10:55

I use my HRM all the time. It is a Polar and while I sometimes get some weird readings on some of the machines at the gym my readings on the watch are no problem. Now I was very used to using a HRM since I am a cyclist and used to teach spin (indoor cycling) classes. What I did find when I first got my PM is I was really interested to see what was going on with my problem (SSS, Heart Block (2nd degree) and intermittent Brady episodes where I would go into a total stoppage for up to 10 seconds). First week home I wore my HRM to bed every night to see what my low HR would be (see if I hit that magic number where my pacer would kick in). Good and bad things about this. I got a really good handle on my RHR but I also did obsess about the fact that it never did appear to drop down to that magic number. (I since have had an episode where I KNOW my pacer kicked in and kept me from passing out or worse because it did drop down to the pacer threshold and I stayed there long enough for me to know my HR was down there when it never should have been and should have been at least 30 bpm higher).

So I guess it all depends upon how you look at it, how familiar you are with using HRM's and their benefits and what your diagnosis is/was. I am less than 1% pacer dependent so for me that first week was a quest to see if the rarity of what they saw in the hospital was really true. But if you are mostly pacer dependent it might be a different story. I am set at 50 on the low end (my RHR is somewhere between 54-60) and per my tech, no real upper limit since I often blow through my theoretical max (I guess they had to set it somewhere, but she said it isn't something I will ever have to worry about at this point).

COBradyBunch

You know you're wired when...

Your signature looks like an EKG.

Member Quotes

My eight year old son had a pacemaker since he was 6 months old. He does very well, plays soccer, baseball, and rides his bike. I am so glad he is not ashamed of his pacemaker. He will proudly show his "battery" to anyone.