sudden bigeminy

[brooksej]

Hi. 46 year old male who has felt quite healthy until 3 days ago. I have suffered from arrhythmia in the past (PVC). But have been completely free for well over a year. When I did have them they were very random but often. A couple a minute at times. But last Sunday I woke up and when I got out of bed could feel them again. But this was constant bigeminy which has freaked me out. If I lay down and just relax they seem to go away after a couple minutes. But if I get up and hit the stairs it goes back to bi or tri. It does seem to be someone positional in that I can stretch and stand up leaning backward and they will slow down. I weigh 230 and am very active at the gym. I went the other night thinking some cardiovascular would get things going normal which was the case in the past. But not this time. The bis just kept a going as I was doing cardio. Anyway have a cardiologist appointment in 3 weeks which was the earliest I could get in. In the past my GP told me to go home and relax?  Should I continue 8th that realm or go see him again in the meantime. (Current mess are Paxil for anxiety and testosterone for low T)
Thanks

[brooksej]

Ugh this is turning into a long story. So on the next day they seemed to not be going away and I went to the ER. They hooked me up and saw all of the PVCs. They completed blood work and a chest X-ray. Everything came back fine. They took two separate troponin tests to see if there was any change in the 6 hours I was there. But everything was fine. So they sent me home and told me to contact a cardiologist the next day and have a stress test. So after a couple phone calls the next morning I got the stress test for the past Monday. I completed several stages of the test but pooped out when climbing that mountain (treadmill).  I reached my max heart rate and the pvcs disappeared with the heavy exercise. Though they did see a few PAC enter the picture. My blood pressure went up which was good and when I cooled off the pvcs came back. They said thank you and sent me on my way. I don't see the cardiologist for another week which is a bit stressful. I just so happened to have a doctor visit with my primary the day after the stress test as he wanted an update on th ER visit. He heard a verbal comment on my stress test that it may be inconclusive. So back to sitting and waiting. I will try those apps thanks marlin.

[marlinspike]

Hi brooks. I would do what you can to calm the pvcs, even if that means cutting back on exercise for now. If it is any consolation, I get frequent pvcs and had a spell of bigeminy last July. I went to the ER, got hooked up to the ekg monitor and saw a cardiologist. He said they were the usual pvcs and it did not matter that they were 30 a minute, I could go home. If your heart is structurally ok, even bigeminy is ok. Thankfully they calmed down that night. Many people find changing position causes pvcs - I have read that the heart can touch the chest wall and this can trigger it. I have found meditation helpful - the Insight timer app is free and the Tara Brach website has free guided meditation downloads.

[Jerry_NJ]

I think it best to "Cool" the hard exercise until you get an approval from your cardiologist.  

I do not suffer from similar problems, but I have read about breathing and physical stretching-like exercises that can help relieve..maybe you are familiar with them.

I'd add a aspirin to my daily intake of "meds".  Of course if your stomach or other problems say no to aspirin, that is the rule to follow.  Aspirin is something you should discuss with your doctor(s) if you decide to take ongoing   I have been taking a low dose aspirin for years.