Ectopic heartbeats

[kingsnorth]

Good morning everyone l hope you are all well. My gp phoned yesterday with the results of my holter test, she said it shows ectopic beats l think 77% was mentioned but l can’t be certain as l panicked. A cardiologist will be phoning me on the 9th to discuss things. My gp said the ectopics beats may be the reason l was having lots of symptoms. Is ectopic beats AF. I also have a leaky valve but apparently this hasn’t got any worse since 2014. An ultrasound on my heart apparently showed my heart wasn’t damaged

[Hidden]

No, ectopic beats are not AF. AF is an arrhythmia involving a fast and irregular heartbeat sometimes triggered by ectopics when you have the condition, and would have been diagnosed via the holter if you had it. From what you’ve said, you just seem to be having a lot of ectopics, and as the GP says, a high burden of ectopics can lead to increased symptoms. If you heard correctly, a burden of 77% (burden simply meaning the amount of ectopic beats you have) is very high; depending on your heart rate, you could be talking about more than 60,000 ectopic beats in a day. The question is whether they are just ectopics that can be ‘ignored’, or whether you need medication and/or further treatment. If lots of the ectopics are ventricular, then it may be they suggest more than medication to stop them. The good news in all this is that you have a diagnosis, and you know that regardless of how uncomfortable the ectopics can be, your heart is currently sound.

[kingsnorth in reply to Hidden]

Thank you Charlie you explain things so clearly, l know I’m feeling so tired l was gardening yesterday and it made my ectopics worse. My gp did say my heart appears to be ok.

[Hidden in reply to kingsnorth]

I’m glad it helped. It’s an understandably scary time - anything to do with our hearts is! - and having things explained in a clear, straightforward way is what we all need. I think sometimes even the best doctors forget that we haven’t all had 7+ years of medical training to make sense of what they’re telling us and put it into the right perspective.

[Prada47]

Hello

I have had them for 40 years or so and I am still here to talk about them.

I also have a very high burden of ectopic beats.

I do take a 7.5mg Bisoprolol which helps to control them along with the Entresto . So try not to worry they are manageable, and not life threating.

It makes me smile when I see your name Kingsnorth was a power station long in my past !!!

Vaccinated Hands face Space to stay safe

[Zorby]

I am 66 and was first diagnosed with ectopics when I was 38. The first thing my cardiologist said to me was calm down, no one ever died from having an ectopic heartbeat 🙂

He went on to explain that it is caused by extra electrical stimuli causing part of the heart to occasionally beat out of synchronisation thereby effectively cancelling that particular beat.

I had ablation twice and it went away between 40 and 60. Now it comes and goes depending on my general health ( worse if I have any sort of virus) and what mix of medications my cardiologist wants me on ( better when I am on a beta blocker).

Today is a bad day, missing one in 4 or 5 beats. But still functioning normally and have a medical appointment in the pipeline.

Most important the first cardiologist was right, it hasn’t killed me ! 🙂🙂🙂🙂🙂