60 YEARS AND COUNTING

Yay You!!!

by Gotrhythm - 2023-08-05 15:48:51

It's so exciting to hear from someone who has been in on pacemakers from the ground floor as it were.  Who remembers when they were cumbersome things with batteries the size of a radiator. And before that, when the patient was restricted to a room where the equipment was housed.

We're probably about the same age. I remember reading about this new technology called pacemakers in Readers' Digest as a girl in the 1950s. I've only had my pacemaker for 13 years now. These days, pacemakers are associated with old people.  But you are the kind of person for whom pacemakers were originally developed. Young people who were healthy and who could life long, full lives, if only their hearts could beat regularly enough.

I'm happy to know that you have lived, happily and well, for 60 years. Thanks for checking in!

Thank you for sharing!

by John_Locke - 2023-08-05 16:31:11

I'm very much a newbie in this club but it's always inspiring to hear the stories of the people that have been on this journey for longer. 60 years is quite a track record!

Five+ years and counting this end

by Gemita - 2023-08-05 17:29:06

Hello Chris, many congratulations to you, to your family and to all your devices that have helped you to reach this grand total and in such style too.  Any chance of taking a photo of that JAMA article, or the first page, and posting it to the Gallery?  Would be great to see.  

You seem to have had many devices and also some lead changes.  That is the one thing that worries me, getting replacements although they do seem fairly straightforward, providing we can avoid getting an infection during battery change.  Do you have any abandoned leads or have they removed anything no longer in service?  That is another concern.  I need to learn to relax since I still have 3+ years battery remaining.

Thank you for coming back to tell us your success story and do visit us frequently to keep our spirits up

Wow

by Lavender - 2023-08-05 17:33:36

That's a lot of devices to have over 60 years. I guess the early ones didn't last too long! Glad you pop in now and then to encourage those of us coming up behind you on the journey!

Brilliant

by piglet22 - 2023-08-06 06:56:10

How amazing.

The first thing I do is think what technology was available at the time and it's little wonder that it was an external device. It almost defies being called a device, more a large brick of electrical and electronics.

I'm not going to put dates onto things as I will get into trouble, but 1963 was back in valave days and even simple things like transistors were only just emerging into equipment.

For those of a certain age interested in electronics in the 60s, they might remember transistors called white s[pot and red spot types. I nevr got them to work and stuck to crystal radios.

For a pacemaker to be available in 1963, it must have been developed quite some time before.

Absolutely everything we take for granted in modern devices was Dan Dare stuff.

From Lithium cells to Bluetooth, memeory chips, processors, materials, PCBs even the way leads were made has all eneabled the minute devices we have now.

I'm surprised you didn't have to wait while the valvres warmed up and someone topped up the car battery.

I know we sometimes complain about gadgets and consumer electronics, but we have adebt of gratitude to all the people who have contributed towards to elecrtronics in general and to those who cobbled together the first and the latest implantable devices and not least, the early patients who pioneered the use of them.

It's a bit like the early Apollo missiions running on less comuting power than a mobile phone.

You can now pick up a processor chip for less than 50p that early pacemaker developers would have died for.

Great story.

Relax Gemita

by piglet22 - 2023-08-06 07:06:08

It's a breeze. They smother you in disinfectant.

My only tip is make sure they don't let the damn battery go nearly flat.

I can tell you from personal experience that 3-monthly checkups aren't enough and that was pre-bedside monitors or Bluetooth. 3-months is easily long enough for the battery to die.

As you know, I have not a lot of confidence in my "team".

Squeezing the last penny's worth of energy out of an already 11-year old battery isn't good for anyone.

Piglet

by Gemita - 2023-08-06 08:09:08

It's not the actual procedure that concerns me, just the increased risk of getting an infection with each successive device change, and the risk is real and always there.  Mind you at nearly 75, I don't suppose I can look forward to too many changes and my first one due in a few years will probably be my only one . . . so yes I think I can afford to finally relax.  I hope they will change mine well before I start having symptoms.  Your experience sounded a nightmare

Thank you CHISPCRITTER57

by Shaun - 2023-08-06 08:17:49

Wow, what an amazing story. That brought to mind a story my wife often tells me about her grandmother who received a pacemaker in the early 70’s. I believe it was an internal pacemaker, but it left a huge bulge and open wound under her arm which caused her excruciating pain. Since receiving my own pacemaker 9 years ago that story has left me with a huge amount of gratitude to early pioneering pacemaker patients such as yourself and my wife’s grandmother who provided the foundation for the development of the amazing pacemaker technology we have today. So a huge heartfelt thank you.

Gemita

by piglet22 - 2023-08-06 10:10:27

It was.

First of all trying to work out what was going on, bearing in mind I was on my own.

Tried 111 and they didn't have a clue, so they arranged an ambulance.

All I had with me were the house keys.

From 7pm to 3am on a trolly and waiting three hours for the on call physiologist to come in.

3pm got to the ward, no sleep, prepped and went into the theatre at about midday. Almost a relief.

They did get me ready for external pacing going in through the groin.

Without too much detail, first of all they have to get the old one out which had 11-years to bed in. Then there's the delicate task of disconnecting the old generator leaving the leads in place. These are fairly complex connectors and of course need to be waterproof. A lot hangs on this bit being just right. Once disconnected to my old friend, there was the decision on whether I could get through on what remained of my original pacer (sinus). They went ahead without external pacing. Then it was put it all back and tidied up.

It would have been interesting to have seen the old device.

You could say it messed up my plans for the day and I wasn't best pleased that this significant event hadn't been better prepared for.

I think I will be getting number three ahead of you and I already have the date pencilled in. January 2025. That will be 9-years of service, if all goes to plan......

Future developments

by piglet22 - 2023-08-06 10:26:05

Some of the obvious ones will be futher miniaturisation, lower power consumption and longer lifetime cells.

I think the real development will be on the programming side, artificial intelligence drawing on the wealth of knowledge gathered and coupled with hugely powerful computing power to genuinely allowing the device to work autonomously.

Not yet having access to a device with patient accessible information, I hope that a lot more information is available to patients via mobiles etc. This could be on the basis of simple summaries or as much detail as you can digest, or none at all.

Future developments - at least I can dream

by Gemita - 2023-08-06 13:23:14

I hope that leadless technology will quickly emerge as a better, safer pacing option and that many of the hurdles of leadless technology today are quickly overcome.  Perhaps we will find safer positions where a leadless pacemaker could "effectively" be implanted rather than directly into the heart.  I wonder what the future holds?  

I would like to see a device developed that could be upgraded to effectively treat a change in our heart condition without the need for explant of our old device and implant of a new system.  For example where a patient develops heart failure and needs an upgrade from dual lead to CRT pacing. 

As an arrhythmia sufferer, I hope future pacemakers will effectively treat all arrhythmias, to reduce our need for medication and more invasive treatments like an ablation.  We have already come a long way but we still need more effective pacing solutions.

I agree completely with Piglet, I would like device data to be more accessible to the patient, so that those of us who wish to access their data will be able to do so quickly and securely.

Happy Birthday!

by BradyJohn - 2023-08-07 00:19:24

Thanks for sharing your story!   I am just a couple of months younger than you are.   I met someone in 1968 who had a pacemaker,  he was an elderly (to my mind) neighboring farmer.  I had no clue I would get one myself in 2020.  I share your wonder at the technology available to us today.  

Many happy returns, 

John 

DUDE, YOU ROCK!

by dwelch - 2023-08-09 15:25:07

Not that you had a choice in the matter, but THANK YOU  for being a part of making pacemakers something that have saved so many lives including my own.

From time to time in my (painfully long) posts I mention my doc showed me the hockey puck sized pacers, perhaps to show how "small" the one I was about to get (1990s).  You are one of the old timers that have another one or two devices before myself and some others on this site when they were not yet on the verge of "common" and were massive. (re-reading your post, a dozen or two more devices than folks like me on this site)

I love your post, you rock, thank you so much for making our lives better.  And thank you so much for being on this site in general.  Next year will be my 2/3rds year I have to do the math to celebrate the exact day (I had a half life day off when it happened.  I will have had pacers two thirds of my life. 

I have a 35 year old lead I use, one that is broken and a 28 year old lead I use and a five or so year old lead a use, four leads on one side.  Last visit doc started hinting at we are probably going to have a talk about those old leads on the next device.  Cant imagine how many leads you have had come and go or even when they were first able to remove leads since even in the 90s that was not a thing.  Apparently the norm when I got my first one was prone to breaking leads and they route them differently now, yet I have this old lead and if the doc had not broken the other one during the surgery I might be actively using two 35 year old leads.  Im on device 5.  I think evey by the 1990s the tech was so much better than your 1960s models, I suspect your first half dozen to dozen devices were from the 60s to 90s.  

I wonder how many doctors you have retired and how completely intimdating you are to the next cardiologist that meets you, holy shit this guy probably knows more about pacemakers than I will ever know.   I would love to have been a fly on the wall to see the docs reaction.

Congrats to 60 years and may you have many more devices to come.  Thank you for being part of this club and sharing with us.