On Saturday evening my heart rate went crazy. I wear an Apple Watch so could see it was at over 200BPM. I’d had this happen once before and it had resolved itself after a few Minutes. After about 15 minutes of this I asked my husband to call an ambulance as my chest was starting to hurt. Anyway; long story short - ambulance, A&E, 2 injections of something that made me feel like i was going to die (Adenosine?), heart rate came right down and they let me go home 2 hours later.
So it hasn’t reoccurred but I’m feeling fragile. I feel tired, my chest feels tight and my breath shallow. I’m guessing that as the episode lasted a good hour before the drug kicked in that the muscle in my chest took quite a workout, so maybe this is normal?
I was off work on Monday and only managed a couple of hours yesterday I wondered if anyone with experience of this could let me know how they feel afterwards?
All in all it was a pretty terrifying experience and i really thought I might die.
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Mikocat
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Sorry can’t help as I don’t have that but god it sounds awful and of course that would have terrified you, maybe visit the gp if your not feeling right
I suffer with a fast heart rate all the time, but 1 time in A&E it did go all the way over 160 whilst I was laying in the bed & again when I stood up as they were only concerned about checking my blood pressure. It was really scary the 1st time as I was all by myself & none of the staff came to help me
All I can say to you is go to see your GP if you still don't feel right & have any concerns
Poor you! I had SVTs for a number of years and had adenosine twice - it felt like I was being murdered - luckily the doctors were very sympathetic while giving it as they knew how horrid it is.
Have you been told about the valsalva manoeuvre and blowing down a straw and some other tips that sometimes stop SVTs?
I eventually had an ablation as mine were become more frequent and longer - one lasted 13 hours and I stupidly didn’t go to
Hi. I used to go up to over 200 bpm and adenosine not only felt like being kicked in the chest by a horse, it made it go faster and sent me into af too. I have been taking verapamil for years and that has settled things down for me.
Hi Mikocat. I too have Svt so I know exactly how you feel. I’ve had mine since a little girl. My heart rate would go up to 250/270 lasting 3hrs. Was taken into hospital twice last year and given adenosine (horrible experience). Once home it literally took about 3 weeks to feel normal again. I had an ablation in February of this year, but unfortunately have had three more episode since. Yesterday I was taken to hospital by ambulance, but self resolved and this time my heart was only (I say only lightly) 140 beats a minute. After an hour I dialled the nhs helpline who of corse sent an ambulance (grrrrr). Your heart has to work very hard and the after effects for me leaves me feeling weak, with chest pains and lots of ectopics. I have not gone into work today as didn’t feel well enough. I hope you feel better very soon
Thank you for your very helpful reply. I hope you feel better soon too! I find I’m still tight in my chest and consequently feel like I have to breathe more shallowly!
I have had Adenosine about 6 times and how awful, yes it actually stops your heart and restarts it. I had an ablation in 2018 for afib and the svt , afib and aflutter was fixed. I have had 1 afib attack on my birthday in June of this year but other than that I am doing well.
I had my first ep of SVT in 2009 aged 25 - 240bpm for an hour before ambulance arrived, adenosine to resolve about an hour or so later, and then almost a week in hospital because if I so much as spoke, my hr shot up to 200. Put on beta blockers, but I felt like utter pants for about 6 weeks afterwards, incredibly fatigued to the point of sleeping in the chair every day, and a couple of tests have shown I’ve been left with a very reactive hr - resting it’s 60 to 70 bpm, but if I scratch my head it can jump 30 beats, and I quite easily hit 120 getting up to put the kettle on. I really struggle to keep my hr down when exercising, as it readily hits 180 with barely any effort at all on the treadmill, but I haven’t found I have any symptoms so I just keep an eye on it. After my second major ep in 2015, which I actually felt really ill with (pain, sweating, nausea) and was kept in resus for about 8 hours after, I was told that feeling naff and exhaustion are both completely normal after any major cardiac event. SVT may not be ‘serious’ per se, but it does require your heart being stopped to treat if the episode is severe, so it is still a fairly major thing for the body to go through.
Other than the two big ones, I’ve probably only had half a dozen smaller eps a year on average, and that reduced massively (haven’t had one at all since early 2016) when I finally cut out all the things that increased my ectopic beats or raised my hr. It’s been medically proven that all of the following things are able to trigger or increase the risk of SVT: caffeine, ginger, dark chocolate, white chocolate, stimulant drugs (adrenaline, epinephrine, including local anaesthetic for some people), some drugs found in cough and cold medicines such as pseudoephenedrine, and lack of sleep is also proven to increase ectopics. Not everyone finds these substances a problem, but I definitely have issues with some of them: my second big ep was actually triggered by lidocaine use at the dentist for a filling, I have definite issues with caffeine, dark chocolate and ginger, and my worst smaller ep of 4 hours at 160 was triggered by covonia cough mixture. The best advice I can give you is to consider whether or not it’s worth experimenting with the above, because cutting out certain foodstuffs has made a huge difference to my SVT, and much though I miss a decent cup of joe first thing, if I have caffeine I can feel the difference. It’s the same if I go out for a meal and opt for a chocolate pudding - if it’s been made with dark chocolate, I get palpitations.
Not sure how much use my rambling is, but I hope you get something from it!
I have Svt, heart rate 191 last attack. I get tightness in my chest as if someone is sitting on it, it takes me a couple of weeks to feel sort of well again. ADENISONE does not bring mine down, usually a strong beta blocker in the arm and last time verapamil got it down to 90 after 2 hours, it got stuck at 150 after the beta blocker. I will probably have an ablation seeing a cardiologist in 2 weeks. I,m 72.
I've had it happen for four days, takes weeks to get over like you've run a couple of marathons .When it stops you can be very weak just have to rest until you feel better listen to your body get some early night's x
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