Run of PVC's or V-Tach?

Last night I was running up a flight of stairs, when I had what I *think* was a run of PVC's (?)  I had a PVC (pause...thump), then another pause...thump, then a few really fast beats, then another long pause...thump....long pause....thump.  This lasted around 15-20 seconds and scared me half to death!  I felt light-headed, but was otherwise fine.  Has anyone experienced anything similar?  Does this sound like a "run" or "salvo?"  I can't remember the exact sequence of the beats, nor do I know if any of the beats in between were what one would consider "normal" beats.

I'm 32, female, had an Echo done 2 yrs ago (normal), and have a history of sinus tachycardia and some PVC's (but never more than 1 at a time).  Not sure where to go from here.

[Nurse2b1982]

Sound like some bigeminy or maybe trigeminy to me. I thought I was having PVCs "in a row" and turns out it was bigeminy, It felt like they were consecutive, but turns out there were normal beats in there. I get couplets and triplets on a daily basis and I have found that I can't really tell when there are two or three VS one and I feel EVERY PVC. Bigeminy can make you lightheaded(I get this all the time). My PVCs went from 1 or 2 a day to 4,000 litterly over night and I'm only 27, so yours could just be increasing a little(also not unusal). If your PVCs are increasing during exercise, that may be something worth mentioning to your cardio. I was told just today by my EP , not to worry about the "runs of PVCs" or the numbers:) In fact I was told that in a normal heart, VT is not usually dangerous, especially NSVT, which is less than 30 secs.Hope this helps!

[is_something_wrong]

This is both an answer to your question, and to others suffering from skipped beats in stressful situations.

It's very likely you had a short (non sustained) tachycardia run. The question is, what makes you so sure you have PVCs (and VT) and not PACs (and SVT)?

When you get a short run during exercise or stress, it's extremely more likely to be SVT than VT. PAC salvos are fairly common among young people. VT runs are not, though a couplet or triplet may occationally happen in people that are very bothered with PVCs. This is usually not caused by the re-entry mechanisms that make VT dangerous, and is usually a benign condition.

Even on Holter montors, it may be difficult to sort out PACs from PVCs. Computer based interpretations will determine all "wide" QRS complexes as PVCs (>0,12 sec), and as far as I know, most PVCs in younger people registrered on Holter are actually PACs.

Of course, you can't be sure if you don't get this monitored, but my guess is that you had PACs and a run of SVT.