Slow heart beat

Hi,
Would like some help, reassurance and info please. My 87 yr old mother in law has had a pacemaker for 12 years. Changed 2 yrs ago for a new one. Don't know what type or why she originally had it. For 3 months she's been collapsing at any time with no warning. Also she can be just sitting or lying down and gets a dizzy feeling in her head which can last a few seconds to minutes and come and go for hours. This is happening every day and night. At the same time as she gets these dizzy spells her pulse rate can go down to 20 or so and this has been verified by paramedics and emergency nurse practitioner. The last time she had to have atropine to speed it up. Before all this she was extremely fit and healthy. Now shes lost a stone in weight and thinks she's dying. She's been in and out of hospital and had her pacemaker checked loads of times but they say all is ok with it. She's been provisionally diagnosed with various illnesses including postural hypotension, epilepsy. Been on beta blockers, and even epilim -nothing had any effect. Had no end of ecgs, heart ultrasound, brain scan, blood tests, 24hr EEG, continuous heart monitoring, all normal. now, because they can't find anything they're saying it's psychological and put her on Valium. This just made her feel worse and the dizzy spells continued, so she stopped taking it. Also, we can't see how she can make her own heart rate drop so low. She takes no meds except statins. I suppose my question to this forum is, why doesn't the pacemaker kick in before her heart rate gets so slow? Is this normal? When I asked the doctors all they say is -that's why she's got a pacemaker. She's really unwell and very distressed about all if this so any advice would be gratefully received. Sorry for the very long post.

2 Comments

pacing

by Tracey_E - 2014-07-22 06:07:43

Sure sounds like something is wrong with her pm, either the settings have been changed or a lead has gone bad or is no longer capturing. Has the pm been checked? These things would show up immediately. If you have documentation that she's been as low as 20, that should be all you need to get them to take it seriously.

If working correctly, the pm would never let her get as low as 20. They're not programmed in minutes but rather in time between beats. So, a minimum setting of 60bpm means it'll never let her go a second without a beat.

Sorted at last

by Yorkshirelass - 2014-08-08 10:08:51

Many thanks for your positive and helpful comments. Just to let you know that after 4 months of in and out of hospital, 2 observant nurses were able to demonstrate an "intermittent" fault with the pacemaker, this was due to a misplaced (ventricular) lead apparently. So it's now been fixed and all is ok again. Such a shame we had to deal with arrogant doctors who insisted her problem was psychological. No apologies forthcoming though. I hope they can live with themselves after what they put her and her family through. Great forum. All the best everybody. X

You know you're wired when...

“Batteries not included” takes on a new meaning.

Member Quotes

I feel so blessed to have this little gem implanted in me. When I think of the alternative it is quite overwhelming sometimes.