what's with females having babies and heart problems

[nikgirl28]

Pretty much every single female I talked to that had kids has weird heart rhythm episodes...i'm really bothered by this because i think there should be more information on pregnancy and how it affects your heart during and after pregnancy....i started getting frequent one minute heart-pace-went faster episode after my first...and then after my second child i got SVT and PAC constant...i tired of doctors saying it's anxiety....no no no because pregnancy puts a big strain on your body and after you have the baby your body is trying to get back to normal and that unfortuntely includes your heart...but what causes this???  hormones? digestive system?  not having enough blood volume?
just tired of the lack of information that's all...  :(

[nikgirl28]

they also say there is an increase in getting POTS after pregnancy...which is a form of SVT because it is above the ventricles...so when u get pregnant your heart has to deal with the extra blood volume...and then after you deliever the baby your blood volume decreases...different for every women....so you do get svt because your heart is trying to deal with the lack of blood is has to pump and it goes into like a crazy hurry up and fill me up mode...so eating a big meal you are taking more blood away from the heart and giving it to your digestive system giving u svt...and pots in when u stand up quickly and your heart goes crazy filling up with blood because it doesn't have all that blood during pregnancy...pacs seem to me more related to problems with my digestive system...and pvcs seem to be more related to hormones...and svt..pots...ist...a-fib...seem to be more related to lack of blood volume...
just what i think

[deedle1976]

I didn't have PPCM. I was admitted to hospital because of very frequent PVCs and nsvt and syncope. They weren't TOO worried about that but I had several ECG suggestive of left ventricular hypertrophy so they just wanted to rule out PPCM. The syncope was due to anemia.

[aussie mum]

Hi just wondering how your PPCM is now ?? Did you have it whilst pregnet ??

[deedle1976]

I was admitted during pregnancy to the hospital that I worked in at the time, which happens to be a tertiary referral center for PPCM. I was having an echo and was chatting away to the tech. She said to me that she had gone off the idea of ever getting pregnant after seeing what pregnancy can do to the heart. I thought that was a bit of an extreme comment to make (especially to a patient!) but I guess she must see alot of bad cases.

[deedle1976]

There is research which shows that PVCs and VT are induced by pregnancy, however there is no information regarding the actual cause of this. I think it would be difficult to determine experimentally. It's a while since I read the papers but if I remember correctly the authors suggest that the arrhythmogenic effect of pregnancy is due to hormones (they don't specify which ones), increased sympathetic tone, haemodynamic strain and the increased stroke volume of the heart (required to pump all the extra blood around).

There are two papers in the medical literature I have read. The first one is
"Characteristics of new-onset ventricular arrhythmias in pregnancy" published in the journal of electrocardiology.J Electrocardiol. 2004 Jan;37(1):47-53.

People on this thread will agree with the very first line of this paper which says
"The characteristics and underlying mechanisms of new-onset ventricular arrhythmia during pregnancy have not been adequately investigated".

The other one from the american journal of cardiology is
"Incidence of arrhythmias in normal pregnancy and relation to palpitations, dizziness, and syncope".Am J Cardiol. 1997 Apr 15;79(8):1061-4.

There is another one  called "New-onset ventricular tachycardia during pregnancy."  Am Heart J. 1992 Apr;123(4 Pt 1):933-41.
I haven't read this one though, just the abstract.

[finetilthree]

yeah, we all realize that.