Having had a coronary stent fitted 9 years ago at the ripe old age of 43 i am now at 52 starting to realise i should be addressing fitness/diet.
My question is should i be getting the heart racing during exercise or not,and what type of exercise ? I’ve just bought a treadmill and spin bike but not sure how mad i should be going,or indeed how careful i should be.
Any advice appreciated.
Hello, NakedHeels,
I had a stent fitted 3 years ago at the age of 50 after having a NSTEMI during a 3 hour mountainbike ride.
I had the same question when I started excerising again and decided to ask my doctor. His answer was to take it a bit easier than I had in the past and to listen to my own body. I now own a Garmin sports watch and try to train sensibly and not elevate my heart rate too much. I started out with fast walking and slowly built that up to running and I'm now back on the mountain bike, although riding slower than I used to.
Have a look online at heart training zones, and maybe join a gym if you can. My local place is excellent and I love that fact that my training is supervised as they know about my situation.
Take care,
Paul
Talk to your doctors, because it's entirely dependent on your personal condition and circumstances. I had a double bypass four years ago. By the time I was discharged, I was doing the physio sessions, and pushing my heart to an extent that was alarming the physio nurses. But the specialist who discharged me wasn't worried at all, and was just impressed by the rates I could reach, given that I was on beta blockers and so on. Blatantly though, that would not apply to everyone else.
This sounds a bit excessive. Have you run it past your GP?
There are lots of other forms of exercise you can take such as walking with poles. This gets you up to a good pace and if you have some hills of varying steepness around you, its a good work out. Its something you can do in all weathers. First things first though, is to find out from your GP what is appropriate.
As we always say here, I’m no expert, but from what I understand if you are on a beta blocker you shouldn’t have a racing heart rate.
After my HA and two angioplasties (4 stents) I attended the rehab course. Based on age, medication and a number of other factors they calculate your target maximum heart rate. In my case it’s 111. The beta blocker restricts my HR quite a lot so I make I don’t go over 111 for long when exercising.
I didn’t even know there was a target maximum heart rate I’ll have to look into this thankyou for the reply.
It was the first they did at the first rehab session. Weight, bp etc. There is a basic method you can do yourself which is age based, but it won’t take in your meds - but it’s a useful guide. I can’t recall where I saw it, maybe the BHF website.
I’m not sure I’d go to a GP. I’d go to the cardiac rehab team at your hospital and ask their advice . They are the specialists. Unless your GP is a sports enthusiast you’ll get a generic take it easy … the rehab team do this as their job and deal with all sorts of people recovering from different surgeries.
Thanks for reply i agree I know exactly what my gp will say but can i simply walk into a cardiac rehab with such questions 9 years after my operation,not sure how that works
Try a phone call first , ask for a referral from your GP for supervised rehab if you can’t get in. Have you checked out BHF rehab advice ? I’d start just by walking , find a bench mark ( say start with 20 mins ) then add on 5 mins a day and then throw some faster paced walking in ( sweaty, still able to hold conversation etc) . 4 weeks post quadruple bypass surgery and I’m up to over 5km, living it . 👍
My target HR for exercise was calculated by the Cardiac Rehab team. It was set at a level around 112 which was based on age (63,) and, for a while, the fact I was on Bisoprolol. Once that was stopped it was upped to around 130. Before my latest blip I was being pushed at rehab (phase 4) and I had to work quite hard on the cross trainer, treadmill, bike, etc to get to it. I did a lot of swimming pre HA. I would definitely be asking the rehab team at the hospital or the GP rather than setting it myself. Good luck
Thanks for advice i don’t ever remember even seeing a cardiac rehab team although mine was fitted 9 years ago and just the 1 stent ( no HA ).
Having not lived particularly healthily since it’s time to put some effort in now so will definitely look into cardiac rehab it’s just a case of how you go about it,thanks again.
so do that set that figure (112 in your case ) at the max you should be going up to during intense exercise ? i wasn’t even aware of such calculations.
Good for you on your recovery hope you go from strength to strength.
Yes it was the max I should be aiming for. Was told I could go over but not for too long. To be honest I had to push quite hard to get to my max as I have a low resting HR anyway. I think the calculation was something like 85% of 220- age which in my case came out at at 133. They knocked around another 20 off for being on Bisoprolol at the start.
My initial rehab was from the hospital after discharge. I stayed with them until they were happy for me to move to Phase4 rehab which is basically rehab for life. It's more intense and a lot tougher. I opted to use the local cardiac rehab centre about 10 miles away rather than my local sports centre as it is more closely connected to the hospital. It's actually where my appt with the cardiologist will be in september. I also bump into the hospital cardiac rehab nurses/physios from time to time which is nice.
I had another angiogram in July and there seems to be some confusion on my discharge notes hence seeing the cardiologist and restarting hospital rehab for a few weeks to rebuild confidence.
I should also have said that I was told there was an optimum range I should be exercising in for much of a session. Can't remember the exact figures as I haven't been for a while, long story, but something like at least over 115. It's important to start slowly and build heart rate gradually and not go straight to max. Also told to spend time cooling down and reducing HR. Good luck
Talk to your cardiologist, they will be able to guide you better than we can.
I’ve never seen one post op,but thanks
It is worth speaking to your GP and cardiac rehab team if you can. The British Heart Foundation Cardiac nurses can also be really helpful. Their phone details can be found on bhf.org.uk/informationsuppo... to discuss the exercise you are doing or plan to do. They can probably also help you with diet too.
You have not given details of any exercise you are already doing (e.g. walking) I presume this is low. I also assume you are not on any medication such as bisoprolol which can keep your heart rate low and may make it harder to exercise. Did you do much exercise before you had your stent 9 years ago? Do you currently use a heart rate monitor?
If it were me I would start gently and gradually build up, if I went flat out when starting I would probably have given up quickly😀 I have to tell myself it is a lifestyle change not a race.
For the type of exercise, pick something you enjoy - you are more likely to stick to it for the long term. My cardiac rehab class focused on the level of effort (Borg scale) where you can "talk but not sing" rather than heart rate and also looked at how fast the heart rate recovered after exercise
I found the couch to 5k program the NHS reference a good way to get into exercise gently, building to a local parkrun (yes you can walk it, not run it if needs be).
Good luck and let us know how you get on in the coming weeks.
Sources
The NHS has general guidance on exercise nhs.uk/live-well/exercise/e... which is probably relevant if you no longer have heart issues.
The cardiac rehab teams from some NHS trusts have details of the Borg scale and warning signs when exercising e.g. royalberkshire.nhs.uk/media...
The BHF has a general target heart zone calculator although in practice this varies a lot from person to person I assume it sets cautious limitsextras.bhf.org.uk/patientin... this could be a good starting point but discuss it with the cardiac rehab team or BHF nurse first.
Really appreciate the advice ,like i say my stent was 9 years ago but only now am i really becoming aware of the “ help yourself “ mentality.Exercise wise I’m not fat and out of shape although i drive for a living so the most exercise i get are a few miles dog walk 3 or 4 times p/week.It dawned on me that i rarely get my heart rate above walking pace and maybe i need to ? Diet wise i think I’m ok probably a few too many beers but nothing too terrible.I was a fit athletic person in younger years so won’t be a stranger to moving about as such , just conscious of how far too push having not really kept at the correct level since my stent,anyway thanks again 👍
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