Advice for AF

[Leafield15]

Hi my husband has AF and has been really poorly since last July. 2 ablation on he’s still not right. Meds have been adjusted several times and he has another cardio version soon. He gets breathless, unable to walk far, feels sick sometimes, trouble sleeping at times. Loss of appetite at times. Today he had an echo gram which showed he has a poor functioning heart, functioning at 35%. It so worry and upsetting to hear and hard to see him feeling poorly on his bad days. Any help or advice would be appreciated. He’s currently working from home and not getting the exercise he needs so planning to do more light exercise to help

[LBCdance]

So sorry to hear how your husband is feeling. But I was wondering, as he is having various procedures, whether he is seeing a cardiologist. He needs to be able to discuss how he is feeling and how this can be helped. Would your GP be the first port of call?

[Bradee12]

Hi Leafield, I had an ablation back in 2012 for AF. I had lived with it for years, but after having a TIA (mini-stroke) in the January, my wife made me go to the GP. I finally had the OP done in November of 2012! Yes, I'm rather stubborn! Sorry to hear that hubby is needing yet another ablation but I have read that it is not an uncommon thing to have a few goes at it. The weakness and breathlessness are of course because although his heart is beating rapidly, most of it is just "fluttering", rather than solid pumping of blood. So his brain is not getting all the blood it really needs, hence the light-headedness etc. Light exercise is probably not going to help, as the problem is electrical not the muscular part of the heart. They tried meds with me but nothing really helped until I had the op and the heart started pumping correctly. (One med which I think did help was a blood thinner (heparin). This was important to take as one of the problems with AF is that it causes a higher incidence of stroke. So make sure he keeps on his blood thinner if the Dr has prescribed that for him.) Hopefully he can get the next ablation soon and it proves successful. All the best.