Calling all heart specialists
Posted , 11 users are following.
Having found this site, I am quite shocked by how many sufferers there are all suffering with ectopic beats, me included. A lot of you are very young, unlike me at 70! It would be great if the heart specialists out there could read the cries for help on this site and maybe offer us some solutions instead of the flippant comments we get in the consulting room ie. "it's just something your heart likes to do", "it's benign", "it's like hiccups", "walk around your garden 3 times" bla bla bla. Having read many articles in newspapers and magazines on the subject, a lot of them view ectopic beats as abnormal and need investigating - they can cause blood clots to form as blood backs up in the chambers of the heart and could lead to a stroke or heart attack. So why do our consultants largely dismiss us. Is it because it is too costly for the NHS to treat us in that offering us an operation is something our doctors could not afford from their budgets? I am rather cynically suspecting this!
1 like, 25 replies
Chalky1991 diana06006
Posted
I think that the reason we feel them is someting to do with the posstion of our hearts and stomachs and possibly our vagus nerve. I think when our stomach expands it puts pressure on the vagus nerve in some way which can stimulate the issues. this by the way is a very laymans view and im sure im wrong however i have reached this conclusion from years and years of trying to find or justify a reason for this horrible condtion in my own mind.
So yes Diana a cure would release many of us from our self inflicted jails.
k3rivers Chalky1991
Posted
Merryl diana06006
Posted
k3rivers Merryl
Posted
Merryl k3rivers
Posted
Aidan4224 diana06006
Posted
k3rivers Aidan4224
Posted
Chalky1991 Aidan4224
Posted
I wish there was continuity across the board here. I also exercise however I get occasional ectopic a whilst exercising just bigger. My theory is that as the heart is working harder and pushing more blood around so the ectopic is going to feel much more powerful. My Cardio said that was the case and you can get them during exercise, also before and after which I heard is more serious, but the cardio said this was not the case. Confusion all around as one person says one things plan other something else! Makes me scared to exercise.
derek76 Aidan4224
Posted
k3rivers diana06006
Posted
Oh my EP has offered to do another ablation to try to rid the ectopics (1st one did not help) but says this time it will be more dangerous to go near the pulmonary artery etc.,... He also said a 90% cure rate (if it does not kill me). This is in the USA. I am too scared to try it but I bet alot of sufferers would go for it.
diana06006
Posted
ali40171 diana06006
Posted
kingclart69 diana06006
Posted
I first discovered I had a heart issue 15 years ago during a routine medical. It seemed to disappear but I have been having fairly regular palpitations for a good number of months now. I am 69, work out 3 times a week and walk a lot. I do not smoke, rarely drink caffeine but enjoy alcohol. The attacks invariably strike when I am at rest and I have a great little app on my phone which records my pulse rate and shows my heart rhythm in wave form.
I find that if I get up and do something I am less aware of the symptoms and they diminish. An " attack" can invariably last over an hour.
I have just finished a week of tests, 7 day wire, ecg, echo cardio gram which seem to confirm that my heart is sound and that I am suffering from Ectopic beats.
Advice is to live with it or use beta blockers which I am not keen to do.
I previously, before I saw a specialist, stopped caffeine and alcohol for a month but the attacks did not diminish.
So for now I will live with it, I will move around when I feel an attack coming on and if I need pills in due course .. so be it.
Chalky1991 kingclart69
Posted
I stopped them on the advice of the cardio as my pulse dropped to the 30's in my sleep which is too low.
derek76 kingclart69
Posted
derek76 Chalky1991
Posted
Chalky1991 derek76
Posted
derek76 Chalky1991
Posted
As I said elsewhere a friends wife in her early 60's has them and runs three to five miles most days and does mountain treks at altitude. She initially took beta blockers..