Echocardiogram - Right Bundle Branch Block

Posted , 3 users are following.

I have been advised that I may need an echocardiogram for the above condition that has shown up on a recent ecg.  Last on December 2015 was normal, though!  

I have been advised that this will have to be undergone at RUH Bath, and it coukd take several months for an appointment.  I have spoken with a person in cardiology at the hospital, and the response, was exactly as expected "it all depends...."   Totally non committal and unresonsive, and side stepping every possible question.

The above depends upon the outcome of a third ecg, the third taken this morning, so I do not know the outcome of that one.

Does anyone have experience of this hospital, and what the expectrd waiting times are?  I have surgery for a total hip replacement booked in for April 4, but the anaesthetist will have to decide what he wants to do dependent upon the outcome of this further ecg and how it compares with the previous two.

Obtaining information from any organisation/agency in the UK is impossible, in capital letters!

 

0 likes, 4 replies

4 Replies

  • Posted

    Dear Susie

    Sorry to hear you are having problems with your heart.

    I have not attended the hospital you ask about but I have an echocardiogram and had to wait a few months for it.

    Perhaps that's just the waiting time for them.

    If your dr or cardiologist feel it's urgent maybe they can rush it up for you.

    Sorry can't be of any help and I know its no comfort knowing lot's of people have this problem but we are all still here fighting for some answers.

    Stay positive and good luck.

    Gap

  • Posted

    The first Echocardiogram I had was done on the day my GP sent me to the chest pain clinic when my BP was 210/110 so it was done right away after an ECG.

    The next one I had was when I went to hospital for laser surgery on my enlarged prostate. When they did pre op checks the anaesthetist did not like my ECG results and was afraid that I might die on him so I had an echocardiogram on the morning of the operation and it reassured him to proceed.

    Seven years later when it was suspected that I had aortic stenosis the cardiologist wanted an echocardiogram and warned me that it had a long waiting time and to cancel my next appointment with him if I had not had it by then! I started to phone the hospital asking for a date for it and they were unhelpful. One day I was told that they had a cancellation for one day in the following month and I managed to get it. That was seventeen weeks from my initial cardiology appointment and three days before my next one so they can take a long time. 

    Twice this year I have been to A&E at weekends with an irregular heart rate and raised BP and had an ECG and and echocardiogram there and then. I'm sure that you can find enough symptoms to take you there on a non strike day.

     

    • Posted

      Hi Derek:

      That's quite a history!  I am so sorry that you have had so many problems and do hope that they are al past tensem now.  

      The clinic where I am having the hip replacement contacted me this afternoon and said that their cardilogist wanted an echo done.   We have a surgery close by, unrelated to mine, that has the equipment, and it looks as though they will be able to get me seen pretty fast.  The clinic is keeping the op date pencilled in. 

      I think my problem is down to a history of smoking although I have been smoke free for about a year, with a few lapses, and plenty of stress, more than my fair share!  There is also the possibility of heart attacks that I had dismissed as digestive issues.  One in particular, was following a stint in Paris where the man I was with marched me up to the top of Sacre Couer, knowing full well that I was a smoker.  When I returned to the UK, I had chest pain some weeks later, and this, I believe is what they may have found.  There were a couple of milder ones a few years later.  They all disappeared very rapidly, when I stood up, though.

      I have to wait for an appointment, so there is nothing further I can do. My GP is fully on top of it,  as is the admin department and the clinic itself, and I shall do my fair share of chasing up.

      I will keep you in the loop.

    • Posted

      I'd been good for many years:-) I stopped salt and sugar around 1984 and smoking in 1993. Did it do any good? In 2000 I had hypertension and by 2004 T2 diabetes.

      After the 17 week wait for the echocardiogram that showed I needed my aortic valve replaced it was a 10 week wait for an angiograms (End October)  that was clear. I was told that my valve would be replaced before Christmas. In December I checked to see where I was on the list but had not been referred as the Registrar had gone on a month’s holiday without doing the paperwork. It stretched out to the end of May before having surgery. 

      I then went into AF as a result of the operation as many evidently do but back into sinus rhythm after a later cardioversion but two other procedures put me back into AF and I eventually had an MRI compatible pacemaker fitted in July of last year. I now need an MRI scan on my spine but the imaging department at the hospital that fitted the pacemaker does not yet have a protocol for scanning the make of pacemaker that they are fitting. History gets worse with time,

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