Please Respond Before This Weekend I Am Really Worried

[Dave-Ponticeli]

  Hello, I have written here before concerning PVC's I get, and I thank you all for all that you are doing for us.
  I came back from an EKG test done on me today and am quite worried over the results. I have a family history of heart problems, Grandfather age 88 still living but has had a heart bypass, an Uncle who had a quad bypass another Uncle with tachycardia and my Mother died at the age of 47 of a massive heart attack. I am a smoker 1/2 my life now, but am weening off of them, and want to quit but I guess not bad enough to just throw them away , but I will, especially as I get older and see the bad things it can do.
  My past EKG's have shown abnormal, but I don't know exactly if it was just what was written on top or the actual readings, but I did have a heart cath in Feb. of 97 and it showed that my heart was in good shape, but the heart cath was ordered because my cardio lite test showed something in the left side of my heart the left lower chamber or something like that, now to go back further the cardio lite test was ordered because the Doctor told me that I had abnormal EKG's.
  Below is what it reads on top of my EKG
  ***************************************************************************
  Vent. rate 69 bpm
  PR interval 188 ms
  QRS duration 102 ms
  QT/QTc 372/398 ms
  P-R-T 49 -68 35
  Normal sinus rhythm
  Left anterior fascicular block
  Cannot rule out Inferior infarct (masked by fascicular block?), age undetermined
  Abnormal ECG
  ***************************************************************************
  So thats it, this is why I am worried now I was told before that the Doctors go by the actual readings and not the top part of the EKG results and my wife is trying to convince me that they wouldn't have let me leave if the technician had seen anything out of the ordinary, she says that they are trained to recognize things in EKG's that would warrant further steps while I was there if anything was really wrong. The EKG was ordered by my primarry care physician for just a routine check up and to rule out that the chest pain and tightness is caused by my fibromyalgia and not my heart and I have to start exercising because of the fibro condition.
  Please if you can shed any light on any of this respond before the weekend because as much as I worry about my heart I am going to be in a state of panic until Tuesday.
  Thank you in advance,
  Dave Ponticelli
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Dear Dave
The fact that your mother died at a young age of a massive heart attack is a scary thing. It is wise to be concerned about your increased risk for having heart disease. The computerized EKG reading at the top of the EKG follows a complex algorithm, but is sometimes wrong. The technicians that obtain them may or may not notice important abnormalities. You should call your doctor and find out if he thought your EKG was OK (I suspect it is). It sounds like you have had an extensive cardiac work-up already. Of course, you are still at risk for developing heart disease in the future and should continue to be vigilant.
Having said this, I do think you would be much better off focusing your time and energy on making positive changes in your life instead of worrying so much about your health. In other words, you need to STOP SMOKING. Especially in someone with such a strong family history of heart disease, if you were going to do one thing to decrease your chance of developing heart disease, it would be to stop smoking.
I hope this is useful. Good luck. Feel free to write back with further questions.
If you wish to be evaluated here at the Cleveland Clinic, please call 1-800-CCF-CARE for an appointment with a cardiologist at desk F15. Information provided in the Heart Forum is for general purposes only. Specific diagnoses and therapies can only be provided by your doctor.