Diana Rigg's ablation

[seasider18]

Did her heart stop or did she have a cardioversion?

dailymail.co.uk/news/articl...

[jennydog]

That sounds over dramatic to me. I had a CV during my ablation to stop AF. I would not have known if the EP had not told me and there were no burn marks. If I were an EP I would not attempt treatment of a 79 years old smoker until all smoking had ceased.

[Hidden in reply to jennydog]

Jennydog are you being the agent provocateur here ? 🙂

I see what you are saying but no doctor can make decisions like that now without changing departmental protocol, getting it past the ethics committee etc etc.

Lancelot Spratt is long gone...sadly. The NHS system seems designed to marginalise charismatic talented medics who won't toe the party line. I wonder whether fine doctors such as Sanjay Gupta must sometimes be flying close to the wind in the eyes of the often faceless managers in their NHS trusts.

Interesting point though, does cigarette smoking impact AF in the way that it does coronary artery disease? It might do I suppose given that it must be pro-inflammatory - does anybody have a link to a paper on that?

[seasider18 in reply to jennydog]

One expects an actress to make a drama out of every situation.. I was surprised that they treated a smoker in this day and age.

[Hidden]

Interesting. An external electrical cardioversion in the context of an ablation might suggest the cardiac catheters had been removed at that point. Don't they shock you internally if necessary during the procedure?

[BobD Volunteer in reply to Hidden]

No Badger. Not everybody who has ablation needs DCCV and if it is required to return to NSR it is normal to use external paddles. I know of one lady who had third degree burns on her back which took months to heal. It was thought that there may have been fluid there following long hours on the table under GA.

If course we know that DCCV is not about restarting the heart although it has been known to stop it on occasions at which point CPR is required. Very very rare that is mind.

[Hidden in reply to BobD]

Thanks Bob

I had not realised my intraoperative DCCVs were external. I didn't have any visible burns, so assumed, wrongly, they were delivered internally.

[BobD Volunteer in reply to Hidden]

Need to put an extra two leads into the catheter so easier to put the pads on before they start. Normally just a red patch for a day or so. I guess horses for courses so some EPs may use internal if they expect a problem.

[Buffafly in reply to Hidden]

I didn't either after two DCCVs during my ablation. Very painful neck though!

[Buffafly in reply to BobD]

What is the difference between a CV and shocking with a defribrillator then? I am confused.

[Hidden in reply to Buffafly]

patient.info/doctor/defibri...

This might help