PAC's lasting Hours

[KLWANDS]

I am new to the arrhythmia/ablation world, so please pardon me if I don't use the proper jargon. I am a 38-year-old female. I have experienced occasional arrhythmias that would last for an hour at most, since my late teens. For a brief, perhaps irrelevant background, I had anorexia from age 13-19, was obese from age 20-26, and have been a healthy weight with good eating and exercise habits ever since. I do not drink or smoke (anything). During my 20's and early 30's, I would take Magnesium taurate for the increasingly common arrhythmias, which really seemed to do the trick. At the beginning of this year, I began to experience longer, more intense episodes of ectopic beats, and then in February, my heart would jump from 60 bpm to 190 in half a second, and stay there for hours at a time. Finally, for I had not seen a doctor for at least 15 years, I went to the ED twice in April when the episodes of tachycardia would not stop. I was diagnosed with AVNRT/SVT. I could not be converted with adenosine, but diltiazem was successful. I was sent home the first time with extended-release diltiazem, which did not work and my heart jumped back into tachycardia that last approximately 11 hours before ending up in the ED again. Echocardiogram revealed no abnormalities and cardiologists scheduled me for an ablation the following week.

I had the ablation done in May and have not, thank God, had an SVT episode since. However, the instances of PAC's seem to have increased markedly. I am still on diltiazem, both extended release and the 60mg, which seems to be less and less effective. There doesn't seem to be much consistency to when the episodes occur, and wouldn't be troublesome if they didn't last so long -- anywhere from 6 to 24 hours. Most commonly, they seem to happen AFTER moderate cardio workouts (I used to do HIIT training for 45 minutes, 5 days a week. I can't now!) or in the evening regardless of what I've done or eaten. The beats are extremely disruptive (not "a nuisance", as one cardiologist described them); they're often every 2-5 beats for hours and hours, accompanied by chest and back pain and lightheadedness. While I experience PAC's all of the time, these prolonged, 'intense' events are occurring anywhere from 1-3 times a week.
I wore a monitor for 12 days, which managed to catch one or two "intense episodes", but I haven't seen my doctor yet to go over the results. My doctor says that if the diltiazem stops being effective, he'd put me on flecainide, which I really don't want to be on.
I don't know what to do! I am trying to be calm, to not think about it, but I never know when these are going to hit, how long they'll last, etcetera. I don't understand what is happening or why. I have also started taking taurine and l-arginine, in addition to magnesium taurate, hawthorn, berberine, and just general things like vit C, zinc, and fish oil. Yesterday, I rowed for 45 minutes, and within 20 minutes my heart started, not "skipping" beats, but...vibrating/gurgling/pausing/thumping, every 2-7 beats, which lasted from 1630 until midnight. I am physically exhausted.

I am really sorry for writing so much. I'm trying to be "adult" about all of this, but my life has truly been transformed into something I don't recognize.

[Anthony1945]

I am sorry for all you are going through, STRESS is no 1 factor and worry dose not help I would stop Fish Oil I found it not good for SVT PAC PVC  you must be careful wit supplements if you don't need some I stopped all to try to find if it made a difference good luck.  Tony SC

[Femorous]

I only had afib, nothing as terrible as what you're going through. My incidences were happening more frequently and my Dr said eventually I would be in afib all the time. I had been cardioverted 3 times and that wasn't an option long term.

My doctor prescribed me flecainide. He had me carry it around in case I went into afib again. I was to take atenolol first, wait an hour and then take the flecainide.

I followed his instructions and went to sleep. After two hours of sleep I sat up and something was wrong. I called 911 for an ambulance and my heart stopped on the way to the hospital. The paramedic gave me a shot of something and saved my life.

I was in the hospital for 2 1/2 days because my blood pressure and heart rate would not come up. Most people never have trouble with flecainide but I sure did.

I then had the ablation surgery and it has worked for seven years. I still get PVC's from time to time.

In my case, my afib was structural in nature. I had a car accident at 19 and it cause some structural issues in my neck. I had bone spurs on my vertebrae and they were sawing on my motor nerves. This was causing nerve sparks to jump to my autonomic nerves and override signals to my heart.

Even after the surgery I could raise my left arm and I would get a PVC. If I was sanding or scrubbing with my left arm, PVC's show up. It's really odd, but it has died down.

I should add that I also had a neck surgery to remove the bone spurs. That's helped too.

It's a long shot because my case was so specific, but maybe your issue is structural somehow, maybe something in your spine or someplace else that's irritating your autonomic nerves. The autonomic nerves are tiny and can be affected by all kinds of bad signals.

Research this. There is a physical therapist in Eugene Oregon, Kent Keyser. Look him up. He did some nerve manipulation on me that was fantastic and really helped. Maybe they can point you in the right direction for you. The body is so complicated and everything is so interconnected. Hormones, nutrition, structural imbalances, etc. May God be with you on your journey.

[zoegirl1948]

Could I ask you why you don’t want to take flecainide? I was on it for years the cardiologist took me off told me I probably did not have SVT anymore cause I had it for so many years and apparently it goes away. I just had a heart monitor on for seven days and I still have SVT.   I haven’t heard from the doctor yet as it was on the portal and staff had not viewed it yet according to what was written.
And yes, it is more than annoying.  I am getting a lot of PVCs, and it seems like the SVT episodes are increasing.  
So I was previously asked is there a reason you don’t want to go on flecainide?  I don’t know why my doctor said it doesn’t work anyway and unless meds I’m on the better I like it so I’m waiting to find out what’s next with the results of this new scan