pain from pacer pulse

My 18 year old daughter has had a pacemaker since she was 3yrs. Her last pacer done when she was 12 has worked beautifully until this last 13 months. She is feeling the pacer pulse in her shoulder. Her cardiologist is concerned but they can find no reason for her to feel so much pain. Last night we took her to the emergency room, the pain was so bad she could hardly talk. The ER staff and cardiologist on call were completely stumped. Does anyone have any ideas or has this happened to anyone? I trust my daughters cardiologist, but maybe he is missing some info.
Thank You

7 Comments

So sorry...

by Swedeheart - 2008-04-21 01:04:05

Hello,

I am very sorry your daughter is in such pain. I will assume that the local physicians have taken an x-ray and performed an interrogation on the PM to be sure everything is working properly and her leads have not had a problem.

I have not had this issue, but I did a quick search and found the following on this kind of topic: (Please remember, I am only a patient and not a medical care giver of any kind...)

This first one was a similar question posed on the Cleveland Heart Clinic website:

jimcala: I have a pacemaker and sometimes I get shoulder pain numbness or tingling in the fingers of the arm that I have the pacemaker in. Is that normal? Is there something wrong with my pacemaker?

Speaker_-_Dr__Wilkoff: Numbness or tingling in the fingers or arm is not common after a pacemaker placement. It is most likely related to irritation of the nerves from your spine, it may be related to arthritis. Rarely it is possible that the nerves could be irritated by the leads in the shoulder or be part of something called thoracic outlet syndrome. You should be evaluated by a pacemaker and potentially a neurology physician.

This is a post from MedHelp.org in their forums with patient and doctor:

I hope this helps, thanks for posting.

I have no idea if either of these posts are similar to what your daughter is feeling... be sure to have her provide as much information to her doctors as possible. Perhaps chart the date/time/along with her symptoms, level of pain (scale of 1-10) and her activity level. If she is on any medications have her chart time and amount taken as well. Next time she is seen bring in this information. It can only help to provide additional information. She may eventually need to be seen by a unique specialist.

Good luck, and tell her to "hang in there"! You too!

Swedeheart

Yikes the last post went wonky!

by Swedeheart - 2008-04-21 01:04:50

When I "pasted" the second comments in my previous post... a bunch of stuff popped in that wasn't in the original capture.... any moderators who can "clean" up this???? Sorry! It would be nice if we could edit our posts after....

Swedeheart

I deleted the stuff

by admin - 2008-04-21 03:04:45

That was strange. I delete the strange stuff. You may need to repost your original messages as I could not distinguish between the right and wrong stuff.

Blake

Urrgh

by Pete K - 2008-04-21 05:04:25

Ah, rats!! I wanted ta see it!! Might have made ma day! (Just kiddin, LOL)

Thanks Blake!

by Swedeheart - 2008-04-21 05:04:47

Thanks for cleaning up that weird bunch of stuff... I will see if I can find the article and just put in the link this next time....

Swedeheart

The

by Swedeheart - 2008-04-21 07:04:13

Hello again,

Here is a link to the site where I found the posting that went wonky on me...

http://www.medhelp.org/forums/cardio/messages/36450.html

Several on pains and pacemakers. May or may not help.

Swedeheart

My personal story with pain on left side

by harley63 - 2008-04-22 09:04:55

Hi Mysticpacer~

I'm not sure where your daughters pain is located and the type but here is my personal experience with pain that was determined to be related to my pacemaker.

My PM was inserted 12/19/06, within two days I was back in the ER with complaints of constant pain - stinging, stabbing, throbbing and sharp at times. It was located at the very top of my shoulder, extended upward into the bottom of my left ear lobe and over into the bottom of my lower lip. I had numbness too in the lip. Of course I was evaluated for the possibility of a stroke, which was all negative... all PM test/checks were normal and all lab work was normal. Then they sent in a neurologist... his take was that my pacemaker had to be touching, resting or in some way affecting nerves that fed those parts of my body. I'm now about 1 1/2 yrs post PM placement... the pain is better... it's less frequent, less bothersome and less painful. All test since this all started have all been normal.

I'm wondering that at age 18 with body growth and being physically active if the placement of the leads and PM may need to be looked at closer?? You mentioned that the last PM was placed at age 12. 5 years has passed and her body has changed.. it's at least worth a question to the EP to evaluate. Good luck and I'll be thinking about her as ya'll journey to find the answer or a solution that works for you.

Zoom, Zoom
Harley63

You know you're wired when...

You trust technology more than your heart.

Member Quotes

As for my pacemaker (almost 7 years old) I like to think of it in the terms of the old Timex commercial - takes a licking and keeps on ticking.