Sounds good but wierd

Hi all
I went to our local Pacemaker clinic at our hospital today and had my 11 day old pacemaker interogated. They told me all was perfect with my pacemaker and that it had paced 0% since implant. I know that is a good thing but is that very common with a pacemaker implant? Just curious. Thanks and all the best to each of you.
Howard

8 Comments

Great

by wenditt - 2010-03-29 11:03:16

My first question is..what was your diagnosis/need for the pacemaker in the first place?

If it was for intermittent heart block that would make sense because your "block" wouldn't happen all the time.

I pace 1% of the time. And I have intermittent 3rd degree heart block.

It is good news! :-)

PS

by wenditt - 2010-03-29 11:03:28

At least now you know it wasn't your heart the other day!!! LOL...damn panic! Will getcha everytime!

;-)

I agree

by ElectricFrank - 2010-03-29 11:03:35

Kind of like saying a light bulb is in perfect shape because the switch is off and it isn't lit.

frank

I guess

by The Fish - 2010-03-30 01:03:00

Hi
My heart condition is Bradycardia. The day they diagnosed it, I had about 6 episodes in 24 hours where my heart would drop from a normal 74 beats per minute to 0 and stay there for 6 seconds for most of them and one episode for 24 seconds. Now since the implant it apparently has not done that at all. I am a little confused, happy but confused. Any insight would be appreciated.
Howard

Weird

by edmondme - 2010-03-30 04:03:54

Not sure what to say, maybe there are days your heart does well and others when it doesn't.
After a week, my PM shows 22% pacing and some of the feelings folk describe here is what I notice

If the clinic said it's ok, then it must be, congrats!

Possibly neurocardiogenic syncope

by busby - 2010-03-30 04:03:56

Hi Howard
I really don't think that your episode the other day was totally a panic attack. I was diagnosed 7 years ago with a similar thing- about 6 episodes in one day with my heart rate dropping from normal to 0 and staying there for up to 1 minute. Since then my pacemaker has prevented me from fainting, but every now and then I have a day of about 6 episodes where I just feel weird, like a de javu feeling and I turn white and sweaty. The reason that this happens is that not only is my heart trying to stop (and the PM takes care of this part), but also the blood vessels are dilated so that blood is not quite getting to where it should. Maybe your reaction to feeling dizzy was a panic attack, but I don't think that you got lightheaded because you were suddenly panicing after feeling ok before.
I had my first visit to emergency this week after 7 years. I had a really long dizzy episode and feeling as though I wanted to be sick. By the time I got there everything was ok and remained that way for the rest of the day. I did not see one single PM spike on the heart monitor all day! They think I could possibly be having adrenalin surges and I am presently doing a 24 hr catecholamine test.
Hope this helps
Robin
BTW I am also a laboratory worker (microbiology). On the days that I have had a blood test when I am having an episode I always have a marked increase in white cells. Don't know what this means but there was no infection at the times.
I don't know why your PM recorded 0% but 11 days is not very long. My PM never records these episode.

PM

by cfritza - 2010-03-30 11:03:20

Hi Howard,

I got my PM for bradycardia (they call it Sick Sinus Syndrome) When I first had a fainting episode they implanted a loop recorder that goes under the skin and measures only really low beats and pauses. Well I went a whole year and a half before I had a 8 second pause, and since you never know when your heart will do it again , it was put in for back up. Because more than likey it was going to happen again. So I wouldn't say that's unusual in your case.

cont.

by cfritza - 2010-03-30 11:03:28

One other thing is I was told I pace only 1% of the time and the PM nurse said it most likely because at night my heart would go around the mid 40's ( got that information from my loop recorder) and my PM is set at 50 so it wont let it, so I probably pace while I am sleeping.

You know you're wired when...

Your signature looks like an EKG.

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