Hi,
I am a 28 year old female currently under investigations with Cardiology. Not overweight but not overly active with an office job and family history of heart conditions.
I have had an ultrasound on my heart a few weeks ago which came back ‘normal findings’ and was given an Emron ECG event recorder for 4 weeks to use when I have a ‘funny episode’. I haven’t had the results back for this yet however most readings I took showed ‘irregular heart rate and deviating waveform’ (not sure what these actually mean) I’m no expert at reading an ECG but I could spot a definite extra heart beat popping up each time which would explain the odd thuds. Some of these readings were only in the 80-100s and some that showed up ‘Fast heart rate & deviating waveform’ were 130-140bmp, again with this extra beat in the mix - note that the fast beats I wasn’t doing anything at the time. Also what was noticed was that my T-wave was dropping.. does this mean Ischemia?
Symptom wise - mostly I will have a really bad episode while lying in bed, the ones where I feel I could just keel over. Starts by feeling disorientated and going hot for a short moment, then freezing cold, pins and needles all over, slight numbness, breathless in the sense that I don’t feel like my lungs have any air in them and trying to fill my lungs with deep breaths, the speed of breathing isn’t fast that I should be breathless.. heart rate suddenly spikes and then thudding out of my chest, can’t focus on anything and eyesight blurs, feel completely lifeless and weak to the point I can barely find the energy to talk, sick but never actually been sick.. this will last around half an hour and leave me feeling weak the next day. During the day I will generally just go lightheaded every time I move and my heart rate can go up to 120+ just from standing up after being sat for a short while, and generally breathless even with doing nothing.
Only findings so far are that they found was that my resting heart rate at my initial appointment I had Sinus Bradycardia at 54bpm and an ectopic beat was also found when I collected the event recorder.
I’m trying to not let this control my life at the moment but the not knowing is overwhelming, I’ve stopped smoking, avoiding salty foods, sweet foods, not having caffeine and making sure I’m drinking loads of water daily..
1. Wondering if anyone else has experienced the same kind of thing and if there’s any ideas at all what it could possibly be and/or what I can do to prevent this.
2. Does this sound like AF?
3. Would AF and Myocardial Ischemia show on an ultrasound?
My appointment isn’t for another 2 months so any advice in the meantime would really be appreciated.
Tia x