Post pacemaker/ICD implant pain

• by Gemita
• 2021-07-15 02:46:52
• General Posting
• 1022 views
• 4 comments

Dear Members,

As many of you will be aware from messages here, “post procedure pain” following Pacemaker/ICD implant is unfortunately common.  There appears however to be little in the way of studies done relating to this, other than individual case reports, whereas “complication rates” following pacemaker/ICD implant has been more widely reported and studied.

Over recent months, several members of the Pacemaker Club have expressed a wish to see a survey carried out on how many of us experience pain after pacemaker/ICD implant, the nature and extent of that pain and how it affects different age groups and gender.   

A survey has now been set up with the kind help of Club members and you may wish to have a glance at the questions by going to the SurveyPlanet link below.   Your participation in this survey is voluntary but should you decide to participate, I would like to reassure you that the survey is confidential and will not be used for marketing purposes.  It will be used to help with our understanding of the extent and frequency of post procedure pain, to help improve patient outcomes now and in the future.  The data will be collected by a trusted member of the Pacemaker Club who has experience in this area.  Results will be analysed carefully and reported as soon as possible.

To help achieve an unbiased survey result, we would encourage all members interested in participating, to complete the survey irrespective of whether or not they experienced post procedure implant pain.  Clearly some members will not have experienced significant pain, or developed troublesome symptoms following pacemaker/ICD implant and this needs to be reflected in the survey too.

What are we going to do with the results of the survey?  If we can get sufficient numbers to participate in the survey to make it a worthwhile study (say around 300 members), it is our aim to try to get the results published in a well respected cardiology journal, so that these results are available to the medical profession.  Any paper accepted would have an acknowledgement to the Pacemaker Club.  Results of our survey should help us to understand and acknowledge the complex range of symptoms many of us may experience post implant and how we might best manage these, since most of us will expect to go through several battery/lead changes in our lifetime.

I realise we have a current Poll still running on “How would you describe your post procedure pain”?  Thank you all for your contributions.  I have been advised polls on the Pacemaker Club only allow for a single question and prearranged answers, so our new survey will give us additional valuable information.  The survey should only take around 5 minutes to complete should you decide to participate.

I will continue to “re-post” this message from time to time to try to reach as many members as possible.  I apologise in advance for my persistent, unwelcome intrusion on your “Most Recent Messages page” and I thank you for all your patience and help with this.

The survey link is:-

https://s.surveyplanet.com/bS5tNLhNq

Gemita