palpitations

[cc]

I have posted in your forum before but I have one more question.  Female, healthy, 39 years old.

I was at my family physcian on Friday and she had a letter from my EP doctor.  It stated that I have a normal heart and the following was documented previously on holters and monitors.

I have extrasystoles, short runs of SVT, and short runs of PVC's (6 in a row was documented).  

The doctors don't seem at all concerned about these runs of PVC's because I have a normal heart.  From what I have read anything that is more than three beats of PVC's in a row is considered v-tach?  The EP doctor said no it is not v-tach, it is just considered a run on PVC's?

I am scared to death knowing that I have what I think is v-tach and nobody seems to care?????  Am I making a big deal out of nothing?

What is your opinion.

[comment to chris from Bw]

chris   I am glad also that there is this great support group. It helps to know that other people are going through the same thing that I am. Sometimes it is hard because my family has a hard time understanding what this is. I guess you wouldnt know unless you had to deal with it on a daily basis. As for some of the tests that can be done, there is the echo this test is like an ultra sound of the heart it can detect defects and other things . The stress test is like an exercise test where you get on a treadmill and walk they hook you up to a ekg and watch your heart rythm to see if there are any changes going on.They also look for heart blockages. The holter is when you are hooked up to a little portable ekg it monitors everything your heart does for 24 or 48 hours there are also holters called the king of hearts this machine will monitor your heart arrythmia you press a button and it records the arrythmia for one minute. You can wear this one for a while I kept mine for two weeks you can take it off to shower so its not to bad. I think all of these tests are useful and can help to find the problem. The medicine I am on is a beta blocker called atenolol I take 50 mg a day at first when I started taking it I felt sleepy. But the over time you get used to it and it dosent bother me now at all but everybody is different. It slows down the heart so your heart wont race mine always did and it should take some of those extra beats away. Hopefully I have been some help to you Let me know what happens.   BW

[comment to chris from Bw]

chris   I am glad also that there is this great support group. It helps to know that other people are going through the same thing that I am. Sometimes it is hard because my family has a hard time understanding what this is. I guess you wouldnt know unless you had to deal with it on a daily basis. As for some of the tests that can be done, there is the echo this test is like an ultra sound of the heart it can detect defects and other things . The stress test is like an exercise test where you get on a treadmill and walk they hook you up to a ekg and watch your heart rythm to see if there are any changes going on.They also look for heart blockages. The holter is when you are hooked up to a little portable ekg it monitors everything your heart does for 24 or 48 hours there are also holters called the king of hearts this machine will monitor your heart arrythmia you press a button and it records the arrythmia for one minute. You can wear this one for a while I kept mine for two weeks you can take it off to shower so its not to bad. I think all of these tests are useful and can help to find the problem. The medicine I am on is a beta blocker called atenolol I take 50 mg a day at first when I started taking it I felt sleepy. But the over time you get used to it and it dosent bother me now at all but everybody is different. It slows down the heart so your heart wont race mine always did and it should take some of those extra beats away. Hopefully I have been some help to you Let me know what happens.   BW

[chris]

I'm a 19 year old male and have been suffering the odd heart palpitation daily for about 8 years or so. It started gradually getting worse over the years, sometimes once a day it would feel like my heart was going crazy and skipping or giving extra beats in the time period of about 15 seconds. I would just get up and walk around, then I would be fine. This week has been really bad, in the past few days, these palpitations have been happening almost constantly during the day. There are periods of about 3 hours or so where I will be ok, but the rest of the time, particularly when I go to bed or wake up my heart will start skipping  beats like crazy and it feels like I'm going to die. There has never been any pain involved or pressure. Just basically the  very uneasy sensation of my hear skipping beats. This really scares me, I have had 3 ECG's and so far they have been fine. I don't smoke, drink alcohol or anything with caffeine in it. I am very concerned over this. I find my self feeling my chest and praying that it starts to beat regularly again. I find that when I am in a situation where there is a lot of adrenaline (like an ER visit) my heart seems to beat normally with not palpitations or at least very few of them. I have a bit of stress in my life, I am a part owner in a small business, had my mom pass away earlier this year and just crashed my car the other week. I don't know if this is related or not. Right now I'm wondering if it is safe to go to sleep with all these palpitations and if I'm going to wake up in the morning. I have also suffered so called "panic attacks" off and on in the past few weeks. At first, I thought it was just my blood sugar level because I was feeling very dizzy and felt like I was about to pass out. During this period, my heart rate might have been fast, but there were no actual skipped or extra beats. For all I know, these might not be panic attacks but somthing more serious, this is all up to my doctor I guess. Right now I wish I had a degree in medicine so that I knew what was going on and how to make myself feel better. If anyone has any suggestions on what I can do or even ask my doctor, please let me know. I am very fustrated over this and want to prevent or fix the situation. My email address is: ***@****

I would greatly appreciate any advice that anyone has, thanks for your time, Chris.

[comment to chris]

chris    I am 29 and started having the same thing for 7 years now. The fast heart beat and the skipping beats. My skipped beats would last all day and night with no break. I had ekgs and holters the holters would show thousands of pacs and a couple hundred pvcs. It was awful.These things have lasted for all of these years. I also had a normal echo.Have you ever had an echo or stress test? or even a holter monitor to see what your heart is actually doing. I am taking a beta blocker atenolol that does help some you might want to check into that with your doctor.I have also stopped consuming all caffine alcohol I also think stress can make these things worse. I hope you feel better this support group has helped me out alot.    Bw

[Reply for comment to chris]

Thanks for your reply, I have not had a stress, echo or holter test yet.  I have a doctor's appt. coming up before the new year and I hope to discuss this with him. What is exactly involved with these tests? For example, what is the stress test?  Also, are there any side effects to the medication you are taking? I really appreciate your response, it's good to have someone to talk to who believes somthing is going on here. Whenever I would have an ECG, my heart would just happen to work properly (I think maybe they caught one of the skipped beats, but didn't say anything about it.)

Thanks for your time - Chris
***@****

[Jane in Chicago]

I have it too.  
I dont remember how old I was when I first noticed an iregular heartbeat but my parents think i was about 13.  I know for sure I identified the feeling of what I know know are PVC's when I was 19 and had my first ER run from a "panic attack" (PVC'S).  I am now 35 (female) and they are still going strong.  So am I.  I can go from only a few a day to thousands a day/night. Here's the kicker: after 15 years of this i've found that no matter what I do or don't do they are always with me.  I get moderate exercise, I eat sometimes good, sometimes junk, I'm about 50 lbs overweight, AND I smoke.  But ALL my stress/heart tests were normal (i get them done every 6 yrs just to be safe) I never have caffinated beverages because I've found they make my heart race and when it does i feel the PVC's more, I have normal to low blood pressure and a pulse of 70-75 bpm.
  
Here are some tips that have made ME feel better (i notice the PVC's less):  
Sometimes when they are frequent or more annoying, I eat a small meal.  That seems to help them quiet down. Drinking alot of cold water seems to help a tiny bit too.  
If I have gas or abdominal pressure, they are terrible.
I find that, as a woman, they are WORSE during PMS.  The closer I get to my "time", the more frequent they are but as soon as my period starts, they drop off considerably (indicating stress related?).  
I find when my body begins to relax before i drift off to sleep they get really bad (sometimes they wake me up) but in the morning they are very mild almost to where I hardly notice them. I also find that when I get enough sleep, they don't bother me as much.  
Here's a good one - even when they are very bad, if I drink enough alcohol to get a little more than tipsy, I tend not to notice them very much at all which makes me feel better (I hardly drink though, i hate hangovers).
If I dont smoke that day, they are very faint.  Caffeine doesnt necesarily make them worse, I just notice them more with a more rapid heartbeat.
Ok; here is a personal one so dont read this if you are easily offended - they get pretty bad just before orgasm too,but afterward they are as close to gone as can be.  
I have found that 2-4 Advil before work will get me through several hours. (muscle relaxing effect?)
A hot bath always makes me feel better.
And some days I cant handle it anymore and just want to cry for an hour.  (that helps).
I also refuse to take perscription meds for this for fear of the side effects.  

So what does all this info mean? To me, I interpret it to be that the less stressed I am the less problematic my palpatations are.  I personally think it partially is stomach related in that if there is pressure on the heart from gas/stomach/constipation it will trigger as well as emotional stress.  I really hav no reaction to physical stress although a more rapid heartbeat will make it worse.

Some cardiologist wanted to go into my heart through an artery with a cauterizer fiber-optic tube thingie and burn out some section of the inside of my heart which was "making this happen".  Yeah right, if you cant tell me what causes it then you aint going in there burning stuff i might need.

My current theory is that if I havent dropped dead from all this yet, I probably wont any time soon.  It is one of the scariest and most annoying things i can imagine, but I deal with it every single day and that makes me a better/stronger person than most in my book.

i hope this helps someone out there!  take care.