Weird heart beats

[Dougie3tears]

Have been a runner/bodybuilder all my life.  Currently 54 years old. Diagnosed with bicuspid aortic valve. Aortic insufficiency/regurgitation 15 years ago. I deploy to combat zones annually. Up to last year I have been able to complete PT testing with no problems. The problem I have is during my running my heart rate only rises to a max of 92 beats then suddenly dives to 59 beats I feel weak and have to stop running. Eventually the heart rate returns to normal after running. I take Procardia XL and Tenormin. Please don't tell me to go to the hospital. Professionally I need to know if this is a valve problem or and electrical problem. Thanks for your time.

[Dougie3tears]

I truly appreciate everyone's interest and comments that were posted. I do have an appointment with my cardiologist  May 1st. He will set me up for a stress echo with Doppler 3D. There is something not right with my heart. I probably will have to stand down from my military career. I do fear the thought of having to replace the aortic valve. I will post the doctors findings. Dougie3tears

[Jerry_NJ]

First I'm a guy, so I'll start with the second point of supporting the the post you got above.

But, running with a HR of 92?  When I could still run, and that ended a age 67 when I went into permanent atrial fibrillation, my running HR (here I'm really taking about jogging, 10 minutes miles, mostly level) my HR would run near 150.  Again, I'm a male, but if I recall correctly, on average a female has a higher HR than a man under similar physical stress... I could have it backwards, you'll forgive me I hope, I am approaching 73, that's my excuse and I'm sticking with it : )

[achillea]

I understand your reluctance, as a soldier, to go to a hospital to get an exam for this, but man, there is no way to begin to figure it out without an EKG and an echo.

I'm pretty fit (habitually exercising woman of a certain age) and recently I have run into similar symptoms.  My doc had me on a 24 hour Holter monitor and it showed something called bigeminy (you can google it), where the heartbeat is one early, inefficient beat followed by a pause where the heart really loads up with blood and slams it out.  The inefficient beat is not really palpable at the wrist, so you feel "Beat-Pause-Beat-Pause-Beat-Pause, and it's about half the rate you'd expect it to be with exercise, so not very good for high-intensity.

After looking at the EKG, the doc informed me that it was benign, and that for me there was no way to treat it, except to lower the intensity of exercise when this happened.  I don't love it, but that's the way it is.

However, you are a military person.  I don't know what the regs are for you, but it's possible that this benign condition might be a deal-breaker.  Reading EKGs is a specialized skill, but an experienced EMT might be able to run a check on the QT, just to give an idea.

However, you should know that a bicuspid aortic valve, particularly when people get to your age, very, very often has to be surgically replaced.  This is exactly what happened to the Schwarzenegger, about ten years ago, and he is physically more or less fine now.  Your military insurance would probably cover the same procedure.

http://www.cts.usc.edu/articles_04-20-07_governor_arnold_schwarzenegger-cvti.html