I presume everyone here is aware of the "QRISK2 cardiovascular disease 10 year risk score" that GP surgeries provide. On NICE recommendations, if you score over 10% you are recommended to take statins. If you are 70 years old and male, you are over this score even if everything else about your health is in good shape and so when you reach this age you are advised to take statins irrespective of your health. As you add in other factors such as blood pressure and/or cholesterol, the score goes up.
My score without my AF was 16.4%. As soon as I ticked the AF box, it jumped up to 24.3%. This is quite a jump compared to the jumps other factors cause and implies your chances of having a cardiac event are much increased if you have AF.
I was always led to believe that AF was a benign condition that did not threaten your heart. I'm not sure what to think now. Thoughts?
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Alan_G
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Depends how well controlled it is. IF HR is maintained below 100 the risk of adverse condition is limited but uncontrolled AF can result in Heart failure.
Statins are too much of a political issue here in UK. Very hard to get a true perspective.
I was under the impression that my heart rate was mostly between 60-90 in permanent AFib, until my most recent pacemaker download. I have now been informed that I am having frequent spikes of heart rate, some >200. Happening day and night. I would not have known of this without the pacemaker. This had not shown on previous 4 years pacemaker downloads..
Pacemaker was only active 0.4% of the time but now on 2.5 mg Bisoprolol it’s kicking in more frequently, heart rate dropping to less than 50, I can see the paced beats on the Kardia. Next download will be interesting.
AF as a tick box, yes or no, is meaningless in my opinion as everyone’s AF is different with different symptoms and different AF burden. I certainly never thought of it as benign as it is usually a progressive disease for most patients. Untreated and ignoring it is dangerous in my opinion but when treated can just be a nuisance that many live with relatively well for years.
Best thing is to read as much of the information available to understand and discuss with your medics your unique path for treatment to limit the progression and reduce symptoms.
My conclusion is it is not so much AF but the company it keeps that is the bigger risk to your health. If you have a healthy lifestyle, no comorbidities, no family history I would not be unduly influenced by most GP surgeries stats and postpone statins.
I'm wondering if the answers to your question is influencing your decisions to take a statin, or purely out of curiosity? If you are undecided, let me just say that I take just 5mgs daily, it has no side effects and keeps my cholesterol figure at 4, which my doctors are happy with as they don't want it too low, as it is essential.
I was going to let my cholesterol make the decision for me. The test result I have just received has a total of 5.1 which is borderline but Serum HDL cholesterol level 1.70 which is good, as well as a Serum cholesterol/HDL ratio 3.0 which is also good. As I have no comorbidities associated with my lone paroxysmal AF I'm going to delay statins until my next set of blood tests in 6 months to see whatyeffects my dietary changes have made.
Studies have found that these Q riskscores which are determined by algorithm seriously overestimate real life risk. Your cholesterol is fine. Ignore any pressure to put you on a statin.
The root cause of AF is hard to determine, but some at least is the result of other heart issues, perhaps undiagnosed. Cardiac “events” that increase “owing to” AF are, as a result, somewhat meaningless, if you see what I mean.
Also, much AF is undiagnosed and is first found in an individual after a thrombotic event such as a stroke.
Afib is a condition which cannot as yet be cured, but it can be managed. Its managed in two main ways. Either Rhythm control ( ie, you stay in NSR, or Rate control to keep the HR below 100 ). Often in older people rate control may be the better option. Either way it is managed to prevent complications, mainly stroke and heart failure..
It is not benign if it is not managed correctly, thus the high incidence of strokes in patients with undiagnosed Afib who end up in A&E. Managment strategies inlcudes medications, ablation ( often a first line treatment these days ) and cardioversion. Advances are being made all the time..
In ucontrolled Afib ( permanent ) with a high heartrate the end of line option may be AV node ablation and permanent pacemaker which will control the heartrate
There is an updated QRISK3 Calculator now which surgeries should ultimately be moving across to. You can Google it easily & run the numbers yourself out of interest. I certainly got a significantly different score to the QRisk2 figure my surgery had quoted me.
Thank you for this…..I have just looked it up and checked mine. My risk, with the af included, is just over 22% if I clear the af box it becomes 11.1%. My question is that while I am not having any af episodes (ablation last May, not a blip since, long may it continue) does that mean, technically, my risk drops to 11.1%? I made the surgery pharmacist laugh while he was trying to persuade me to take statins, quoting the 28% (or whatever it was) risk……. I said yes, but there is a 70% or so risk of not having a cardiac event ……………
Yes I’m in the same position as you and I don’t know the answer to that. I do know that both my QRISK3 scores (like you I ran with and without AF) were considerably lower than the single inclusive QRISK2 figure they quoted when trying to strong arm me into starting a statin.
I took them for about 5 days (even though I should have known better) I reacted very badly, and it is now on my medical notes I will not take them in any form.
i’m not sure why you presume anything about this or matters. Some of the stuff I see on here is useless and needless that people are worrying about and getting involved in when they are not doctors and you need to let go and understand your personal condition. now I know I don’t sound very nice but it’s time somebody spoke the truth here there are no stupid questions. That’s for sure if you’re worried about it ask but people also need to realize if it’s that pressing don’t here first call your doctor or go to the hospital. going to get answers from many people and every one of us is somewhat different plus we don’t know you we don’t know your etc..
To me presuming about this thing is like assuming about it. whether it affects the or not so do many other things just like having a pacemaker won’t keep me from having a heart attack if it were to happen. I am not clutter my head up with useless information if it were important, my EP would tell and he talks in terms. He is also a teacher at Baylor Medical in Texas and although I can’t be selfish, he was just given the title of chief and a big hospital in Florida not my first place to go today, but I am so happy for him. There is nowhere to go but up I hope he is happy with it. he thinks outside the box he doesn’t like feeling procedures to be repeated such as ablations, his young In Humble and anyone that gets to go to his hospital will be very lucky. I just moved from Florida two years ago. I would consider going back for him, but he is thrilled with the way I am and said I should only need a battery change eventually and not to his new he’s not gonna be accessible.
As I said, I’m not very nice. I shoot from the hip. I like to show the positive I like to let people know there can be success, even if it can’t be cured and that you can have quality of life again which two years ago I never thought I would see again and never do things that I could do even walking down the hallway brought me to tears
Bob always gives the right answers referring you to things that are simple to read and understand as I have said before we are not doctors I can repeat what I’ve been taught by my EP. It doesn’t mean I can do it and I don’t want to needlessly scare people. One of the first things he wanted me to do was get rid of the oximeter people get way too involved, checking their numbers just like the new stuff for fluctuate constantly when you don’t really know what you’re looking at all you’re going to do is give yourself anxiety
sorry for coming down hard, but I think yours was just the final straw so many people many even older than me. I don’t see their years spent terrified of their body. They need to embrace what’s going on and understand. I can even laugh now when I’m bad and have something like ice cream because most of the time I will get flutter it’s like ice cream headache right in the middle of my chest. It goes away. I know I caused it just like over eating and a very cold glass of sangria will do, but I do it anyway.
if you live life always afraid that’s not really living
The 2 minutes I used to read this is 2 minutes I will never get back sadly. I understood very little of what you had to say. It just came over as a rant that Mr D Trump would have been proud of.
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Paroxysmal AF 
Puzzled by CHADS, response to djroute66
AF and statins
Does a heart still remodel if medications stop AF completely?
