a-fib & PM

Can a PM of any kind stop a fib & also control A low heat beat?

2 Comments

A-Fib control

by Roys - 2014-05-25 09:05:02

Hi Jerry1
Inga is spot on. You don't give any info on your problem, if your are taking medication for AF that can give you a low HR. The only treatment that can cure AF is an PVI ( ablation ) but there are things you can do to control AF, try to find what triggers an episode, mineral supplements can help to control AF. Have you seen a Electrophysiologist for help?
Cheers Roy

Features that might be helpful

by golden_snitch - 2014-05-25 09:05:44

Hi!

Generally speaking, a pacemaker can only treat slow heart rates and pauses. Whenever there is a rhythm that is faster than the pacer is programmed, it gets kind of overrun and can only watch this happen.

There are, however, a few pacemaker features that can help to reduce Afib episodes or help to prevent worsening of Afib, but rather indirectly. For instance, Medtronic has some features, including "managed ventricular pacing" (MVP), "atrial preference pacing" (APP) and "reactive atrial anti-tachycardia pacing" (ATP).

ATP actually works like anti-tachycardia pacing in an ICD: It starts to stimulate with a couple of fast impulses, when it detects an atrial tachy-arrhythmia, in order to interrupt that episode. BUT this only works for atrial flutter, a Medtronic tech told me. It cannot stimulate you out of Afib. But there are quite a few Afib patients in whom the Afib develops out of an atrial tachycardia, so in these cases ATP can help to prevent an Afib episode by interrupting the arrhythmia that would later probably lead to Afib.

Atrial preference pacing is a feature that senses your intrinsic atrial rate (your own rhythm), and then paces your atria just a little bit above that rate. Thereby, your own rhythm shall not get a chance to start doing weird stuff like going into Afib. The pacer kind of stabilizes your atrial rhythm, which makes it less likely that, for instance an atrial ectopic beat triggers an Afib episode.

MVP reduces the amount of ventricular pacing in patients with no or only intermittent heart blocks. One knows that there is a connection between right ventricular pacing and onset of Afib, so reducing ventricular pacing can help to prevent Afib from starting or getting worse.

You can look these features up at: medtronicfeatures.com

The important message is that all these features are designed to reduce or stop events that might lead to/trigger an Afib episode. But once you are in Afib, a pacemaker cannot do much to stop that episode. All it can do, when you have a heart block and Afib, is to switch modes and ignore what the atria are doing and just pace you steadily in the ventricles. But pacemakers cannot shock or pace you out of an Afib episode. Depending on what usually triggers your Afib episodes, the described features might however be helpful for you.

Hope this helps.

Inga

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