Heart Pain or Heart Burn

[VELAJE]

Im a 32 year old Male, 5'7' 159lbs. Over the past two years I've had two Stess Test, One Stress Echo, Two echo cardiograms, several EKG's, X-Rays, Blood Work, and Ive worn a 24 hour monitor twice.  This all started with a bout of PVC's that scared me pretty bad.  They turned out to be harmless.  All the test i listed have never shown any signs of heart disease, or anything abnormal just PVC's.  My test results have been great.  Over the past few weeks I've finished a prescription of Protonix i was taking for GERD.  Since then I've have terrible heartburn, and acid reflux.  I've also have a lot of painful chest pain.  Sometimes the pain is dull and on the left side only.  After having pain off and on for a few days my anxiety takes over and I start to think it coule be my heart.  When I'm active i feel good.  I went for a 30 min bike ride yesterday and never expirenced any chest pain or discomfort.  My last stress Echo Test was about 9 months ago.  My question is: Would it be safe to rule out heart disease from the test ive taken?  I want to stop worrying.  I just cant seem to get it out of my head.  I eat right and should exercise more but i still consider myself fairly active.  You time is appreciated.

[Lucy4550]

I have exactly what you have.  I am now so convinced that there is a realationship with PVCs and GERD.  I take two medications for GERD and they don't help me.  I have not eaten chocolate for 8 yrs.and I still get them.  I love coffee and drink it a lot and it doesn't make any difference in my PVCs.  I get with or without coffee.  I don't see any dietary connection.  The only time I get real relief is when I exercise.  I am making an appt. at MASS General in  Boston with a GI doctor. I want someone to look into this connection more closely.  I can't stand having them and they limit my time with my granddaughter because I'm always afraid I'm going to drop dead suddenly.  The only thing that helps me is Xanax.  I take it when they really distract me.  I still get the PVCs but the Xanax helps me tolerate them.  I just take a very small dose and then again at night to sleep.  Beta Blockers worked for exactly one day.  I'm going to discontinue that med.  Today I had bad heart burn because of something I ate and nothing stopped it and the PVCs were worse.  I felt like there was a gurgling in my upper chest which was probably from the acid reflux.  One thing with PVCs is that those of us who have them tend to take better care of our hearts.  We're careful about what we eat, exercise, etc.  We see a cardiologist on a regular basis.  I also notice an increase in my PVCs during the change of seasons. I'm going to explore the connection there.  After reading all these posts, I would love to be able to get together with everyone in a central location and have speakers come in.  It could be a PVC convention.  It would be so nice to get together with others that experience these.  I have no idea how to start something like this but we could all meet once a year at a large hotel and really comiserate with one another.   I don't know one person where I love that has these. I really want to chat more with fellow suffers!

[LivingInHope]

I think you should get back with the Dr. about GERD, because it sounds like you are still having a lot of acid problems.  This comes from heart disease about's website (com):

"Sometimes the presence of PVCs indicates an inherent electrical instability in the heart, and therefore indicates an increased risk of sudden death. These “dangerous” PVCs are generally limited to patients with significant underlying heart disease.
More often, PVCs do not indicate any inherent problem with electrical stability, and are completely benign"