Ablation or Pacemaker

[dandan2010]

hi am dan 26 and had wpw since i was born. i had a ablation on the 25 march 2010 which they frozen it, i was on beta blockers before the op and they took me off them after op. one week later my heart started to race and had to be taken to hosptial, as it was beating at 200 to 250 per min, when i got there they gave me beta blockers to slow down the heart rate which it did atfer about 30 mins to 1 hour, mine being that the heart rate started 1 hour before. am still getting miss beats and flutters in my heart, when i had my op on the 25 of march my doc said it can take up to 8-9 months before u start to see the miss beats and flutter to go away, is that ture??? would i be better off with a pacemaker or to keep going with this ablation??? PLS can someone help me with this....THANKYOU....

[MJW1970]

First of all, save the pacemaker as an absolute last resort.  I had two ablations for atrial flutter several years ago.  It took a year for the scar tissue to properly form and block the errant electrical signals.  Hang in there.

[itdood]

A pacemaker probably wouldn't help.  If your SA node were dysfunctional or ablated you'd need one, or if you had bradycardia (too slow of a heart rate).

Pacemakers usually can't be used to correct for arrhythmia problems.  There are special circumstances where it might be effective in pacing out certain arrhythmias in the ventricles but I forget what those are and I don't think it can do anything for WPW.

I think some folks get confused on pacemakers thinking they can correct all sorts of arrhythmia problems, but they can't.  pacers are primarily designed for hearts that beat too slow and will increase the rate when needed.  Like I said above, I've heard of some designs that can try to "pace out" harmful ventricular arrhythmias but that probably won't help you.

Anyways, you really need to make a phone call to your doctor and be seen.  They may need to put you back on the BB.  Abruptly stopping a BB can be a bit rough, you may need to be slowly weaned off it.