It’s 6 weeks since the LV lead review/revision and it took a lot more out of me than I had anticipated or planned for. I had the pacemaker check yesterday and YEAH! everything is working and no twitches. Everything feels so much comfortable in my arm and shoulder and I haven’t experienced the tightness and restrictive shoulder movement which destabilised my shoulder girdle this time as they removed quite a lot of scar tissue. I am starting to feel much better, even went for a swim in the sea yesterday, after the clinic and it was wonderful.
The HR is set at 70 which feels comfortable, although my natural resting rate was usually less - 60-65.
I am still breathless on exertion but that may well be because of little or no exercise for a while and the very warm weather. It’s always very hard for me to judge what causes which symptom as both heart and Mg can make very breathless and I just don’t cope with warm, humid weather nearly as well as I used to.
The other big difference was that I started experiencing problems with my CPAP, wakening feeling that my lungs and body just couldn’t hold any more air so it was overflowing, very uncomfortable and it lifted the mask air cushion up, breaking the seal. I rang the CPAP clinic - they are so good! Appointment within 7 days, always seen on time. Efficient evaluation - change of machine to the newer AirSense - no more problems. Interestingly - my old machine was a permanent pressure machine where the pressure was set at 15 which has suited me well for 4 years so I couldn’t understand why I was experiencing so much difficulty all of a sudden. This machine is reactive and pauses on out breath so only gives the pressure required on each breath in - SO much more comfortable and the pressure has yet to go above 12.5. My sleep quality has improved by 25% in 5 days which should drastically help the healing process.
Best wishes CD.
Pacemakers and the hollowing out of life
Pacemaker implant - Week 2
Pacemaker travel question
