Post Procedure Exercise

New myself

by MissAshleigh - 2019-04-20 08:23:47

day 9. 41yo with brand new PM,  very eager to get on with my life! 

 I have been walking more and more… Yesterday? I ran ~4?blocks. Not for exercise,  for work… It was my own stupid decision to accept a job & then I was stuck with a perilous pickup.  I kept feeling my heart palpitate/flutter as I slowed to a walk.  This could be sheer paranoia! 

 I’ve seen plenty of people who are athletes on this forum! Having a pacemaker does not relegate us to a life of no activity! 

I havent  figured it out yet… Hoping people respond who have more info!

adjusting the settings

by Tracey_E - 2019-04-20 08:35:02

It's common to need the settings fine tuned after we get a new pacer. Call and tell them the day/time it happened. When they interrogate the pacer, they can probably see what happened.

If I had to take a guess, I'd say you hit your upper limit. With av block, the atria beats normally but the signal is blocked on the way to the ventricles. The pacer can only pace the ventricles up to the upper limit, which they often start off very low, 120 or 130. So, if we go for a walk and our atrial rate gets up to 140, the pacer can only make the ventricles go up to 120 so the heart is out of sync and it feels like you described. Easy fix, make the upper limit higher. Most everyone who is active and paced for av block goes through this. They send us home with a good guess, but we are all different and it's common to need to adjust. An easy test, if it happens again count your pulse. Is it exactly 120 or 130? 

Post Procedure Exercise

by Jupe - 2019-04-21 13:35:17

Day 6 for me. Walked up a small hill for the first time. After coming back down found myself getting chest discomfort and a litttle bit light headed. I'm guessing too much too soon? I know my pacemaker is set at a bottom number of 60 ( I was dropping to as low as 38 before) Have to find out what the upper limit is. My heart rate was 96 after walking up and down the hill.