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Ventricular Ablation Arrhythmias
Have an ICD that has now fired eight times over the last two years. Was on amiodarone, then toprol then sotalol, now after most recent three shocks (one on Jan 7, two on Jan 10 that also required two cardio versions and a week in ICU) am back on amiodarone and toprol. As doctors don't seem to like amiodarone (at least long term) and I don't like shocks, we are now considering a ventricular ablation cathertization.
I've seen all sorts of posts on atrial ablations, but want to know about ventricular ablations and ultimate success in reducing number of ICD firings and getting off amiodarone.
2 Comments
15 year old son ablation
by Anita - 2009-03-04 04:03:53
My son is now 15 and has had his ICD for 2 years. He had severe Ventricular Tachycardia VF the worse of the worse. He had only had his ICD for 2 months and was shocked at 35 jewels. . It charged up 2 more times but decided he didn't need the shock. His heart rate was 313. Doctors at Vanderbilt in Nashville tn. didn't do alot for us. He wasn't even on a VT meds only lopressor that is for the upper part of the heart. They told him he would be fine that he needed to get out and begin living like a 14 year . Well he did just that. We were in Daytona beach Fl. he was playing with a skin board. He told me he didn't feel well. I told him that he was okay,because that is what the doctors told me I should do... (Never again, I will take his word.) He was shocked 8 times in 19 mins before an ambulance could get to us. When the medtronic comp. came to the hospital he told us it was lethal . He did need each shock, His heart rate was going 315bpm. It also had charge once more but didn't deliver the shock. Im very lucky to have my son. I'm very thankful for his ICD. After returning to Nashville the doctors did change his meds to 240 mg of Sotalol. They told us he would be fine and there was nothing else they could do. That was not good enought for us. We wanted our son to have the best quality of life as possible. We sent all his records to the Mayo in MN. The doctor there Co-Burn Porter called me and told me he thought he could help our son. We went there and he did a 6 hour procedure (Ablation). If this had failed they were going to do a open heart surgery. Six hours later the DR. came out and told us he was almost 99.9% sure he had fixed his tackycardia. He didn't have any trouble putting him in to vt when they took him to the cath. lab. His heart rate was 285 when the doctor shocked him to get him out of it. His heart rate was to fast to fix it the way they first thought. (He did this... He added scar tissue to the bad scar tissue to make like a brick wall.) If the heart did get out of rhythm it had no where to go. Before he did anything he said it was like a picket fence with open holes. When the heart misfired it went crazy. This was in Nov 0F 2007 and we have had no shocks no charging we have had nothing but great success. When he goes to the doctor for his stress test and they get his heart rate up to 160 he still does great. I say go to MN and have the surgery... It has gave my son a better life....He is now 15 and doing alot of things. He deals with anxiety from all the shocks but is doing okay. he would tell you to go to the MAYO! I hope this will help you... good luck... MoM
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I, too, am feeling tons better since my implant.
Success depends...
by turboz24 - 2009-02-01 10:02:53
I assume you have had an EP Study before. If your doctor takes a look at the study, he can give you a good indication of how successful an ablation procedure would be.
I would think the success depends on what the root cause is, the location of the "shorts", how many there are, so on.
In my case, mine were due to a viral infection when I was 17. The "worst" spot was located way up, almost at the ventrical outlet valve. When he went in to do another study, cleaned that spot up, some other locations were also mapped and they were a little harder, simply because it was a cluster, so they basically had to ablate a small circle around that location.
there are several different techniques/tools that can be used, so each doc depending on their experience may or may not feel they can do the procedure in any specific case.
I just can't tollerate any signifigant doses of anti-arrtyhmia drugs, so my best option was ablation.