After three months

I am feeling good! I had my 3 month clinic check and was asked if I felt my heart racing. Yes I told her and she seems to get concerned when I told her I feel it. It seems the pm reading has captured multiple SVT' events as fast as 200 bpm. So great, I went from complete heart block with no beats to 200... Ugh! I have an appointment next week with cardiologist to discuss. If I am correct, these are just annoying and not necessarily harmful??? I really don't want to be drug dependent, but EP nurse said probably have to take them. Can this be caused my the pm? Any words of wisdom out there?

3 Comments

too fast, too slow!

by Tracey_E - 2014-08-28 01:08:31

I have the exact same thing! I love to watch people get confused when I say I have a pacer for for slow ventricles but I'm on meds for a fast atria. My heart is a little schizo :)

No, the pacer didn't cause this. With av block, the ventricles are beating on their own, not in sync with the atria. The pm mostly paces ventricle for us, making sure the ventricles stay in sync with the atria. It's likely the atria was doing episodes of 200 all along, you just didn't have a pm to record it and the block masked it so you never felt it. I don't know where they draw the line between annoying and harmful but 200 is probably higher than your pm can pace the ventricles. It doesn't feel good when the heart gets out of sync. I'm on the smallest dose of atenolol, now my heart doesn't do that anymore. Of course I'd prefer to be on nothing, but this does take care of the problem with minimal fuss.

SVTs

by golden_snitch - 2014-08-28 01:08:55

Hi!

SVTs are usually benign. No need for treatment, if you can tolerate the episodes. And if they do not happen that often it might indeed be better to try to tolerate them than to take drugs everyday that can have side effects.

With a complete block your pacemaker can also be programmed in a way that it does not track these atrial tachycardias. You can program a rate at which it just stops tracking. To stop tracking means that the atria can go as fast as they want, but your ventricular pacemaker lead will stop following their pace.

Last but not least, SVTs can often be cured by catheter ablation. So, if they bother you too much, or the pacemaker cannot programmed the way I just explained, or you don't want to take drugs, ask about catheter ablation. I have had quite a few different SVTs, and all have been ablated.

Were the SVTs caused by the pacer? Hm, rather unlikely, but you never know how a heart reacts towards artificial pacing. I think what's more likely is that you had the tachy before, but didn't feel it due to the heart block. Now that the pacemaker makes up for the block, the SVTs can be conducted in a 1:1 pattern into the ventricles.

Best wishes

Inga

Meds for that

by pioxen - 2014-08-28 01:08:55

Boysmom,

Not to worry. It could just be your heart adjusting from having to compensate for a slow heart rate. If it does become a routine event or too bothersome, there is beta blockers you can take to help stabilize your fast heart rate. Talk with the cardiologist during your next appt, but in the meantime, keep a journal or log of when you have rapid HR events. Note the date and time and activity you were doing. This could provide valuable clues as to "triggers" that set your heart off on rapid beats.

You know you're wired when...

Your pacemaker receives radio frequencies.

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