Pounding heart in 10 month old?

[mshanson]

Hi, our daughter was born with a large VSD and small ASD. She was in CHF until around 6 months of age. Her last echo (4 months ago) showed that her ASD was closed and the VSD was small (not sure on size but max PG was 87.6 mmHg) and she had a trivial/mild leak in her Tricuspid valve. She's now 10 months old, doing great, off meds, growing well (currently 16.25 lbs, 27"), however we notice that lately her heart seems to be really pounding with any amount of extertion - crawling, crying, even just taking a bottle, makes her heart pound quite hard. To the point that even her babysitter has commented on it. When she's sleeping or just laying still it seems normal. Is this normal, or something that she be mentioned to her cardiologist?

[protea]

Sandy do you have a pulse ox.I bought one from amazon that checks the heart rate and pulse ox.I use it to check Broc when he is having trouble.Just a thought then you could tell the card how fast her heart rate really is when she has those episodes.Looking forward to hearing what the card has to say about it.Broc had to wear a halter monitor for the past 24 hours as he was having fast heart rates when he was laying down.We get the results next week some time.

[mshanson]

Last night she it happened again. Her heart started pounding REALLY hard when she was taking her bottle (as bad as it did back when she was in heart failure). The other thing I noticed, while she didn't get sweaty, but she was having  a harder time taking her bottle. She drank for a long time, but only took about half of what she normally would.

[protea]

Hi sandy
Sorry you are having some small issues with you LO again.I would be concerned too.I think you should take her in to be checked and let them know your concerns.Brocs heart does that when he is very active too but then his is because he over does it all the time.PLs let me know what the card says if you take her.

[Jeffrey R Boris, M.D.]

Dear MSHanson,

Without evaluating her or having any other data, I cannot say what is the problem here.  I don't know how fast her heart is going during these episodes.  It is certainly possible that she is having an arrhythmia, or it could be a normal finding.  I would recommend discussing this with your cardiologist, who can get more of a history and examination and correlate these findings better to ensure that she is either normal, or get her appropriate treatment if there's a problem.