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Paroxysmal Supra-Ventricular Tachycardia (SVT)
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I started getting the problem only when doing hard interval or hill sessions but have now had the same problem happen on a long run and a recovery run (both times when I hit a hill). I tried stopping and doing the Valsalva maneouvre but it didn't help but then 3miles or some 20 minutes later it stopped. It has now happened 4 times in 7 days.
Have had a resting ECG and blood tests about 10 months ago which showed up nothing. I'm doing a hill session tonight and if it happens again will be straight down to the GP tomorrow.
take your mobile phone with you and call a friend
Funny Ha Ha.
Corinthian - I see from your previous post you've suffered from the condition. Did you stop training or carry on. If so what did you do if it came on during a run (serious answer this time).
Were you given medication. Did the condition clear up by itself or did you require treatment same as Dr Dan.
I stopped, rang whoever the current squeeze was to pick me up and waited.
I was lucky it only ever happened the once - running a 10 miler, up to mile 4 at 85% max heart rate and then bingo; up to 230BPM in the blink of an eye... so I stopped, sat down and waited for the cavalry to arrive.
I had medication - it fucked me up (Diltiazem and another pill starting with V) I cannot remember.
In the end i was more in AF than out - they tried two ablations - the second one worked.
All in all I stopped running altogether for 2 years. Had the condition for about 5.
If you want more info pm me or dig out one of my old threads - I'll be happy to oblige.
Thanks
I've sent you a message with a few details and info would be appreciated
Hi Malcolm,
I continued training ... if I got an attack, I stopped and ended the session. The only exceptions were in a half marathon and a 10K race where ego got the better of me ... I didn't want to be overtaken by the whole field or have a DNF. My experience was that once I had an attack, the next would come much more easily. So, while training there is NO POINT in continuing to run when in tachycardia ... there is no training benefit to be had, just potential damage. Walk home, get a bus, ring a friend ... don't carry on running while tachycardic.
I didn't take drugs as they would only interfere with normal life ... not something that would be worth doing since it only occasionally happended to me in training/racing ... and anyway, drugs would probably mess up my running ability, so no point anyway. My SVT was caused by an accessory pathway ... it is a wiring problem ... so not something that can be fixed with drugs. It's a short circuit ... the way to fix it is to remove the short cicuit. So, an ablation was the correct choice for me ... I'm now running 50 miles per week and getting faster than ever before.
Dr Dan/Corinthian
Thanks for the info its been extremely useful. I'm going to cut out all high intensity stuff which seems to set it off and just do some long steady runs till I get it sorted.
Hey Dr. Dan, I just read your surgery description (08/06/10). Congratulations!
But boy, did that description scare me from going after the surgery :-/ Yikes...
I've kinda learned to live with it (and hopefully it'll stay that way
). As the rest of you have reported, mine turns up when I'm doing intervals - going abruptly from full speed to pausing.
If I avoid the extremely hard interval-training sessions, and stick with those where I can do just above walking in my pauses, then I tend to go clear.
Two times I've provoked it on hard 10km (6-7mi) trips, speeding up on the final kilometer (chasing that sweet record), and both times after I've stopped - abruptly (passing the 10km marker).
So, that's what I avoid - abrupt stopping...
Just my two cents.
Hope you all do good!
Martin
Hi Guys
Have been to see a cardiologist at my local hospital in September. Had echo and exercise test which showed the heart was fine. Unfortunately the treadmill wasn't designed for running fast and therefore couldn't trigger an attack. Had a monitor fitted for 5 days and trained normally. Recorded 2 attacks while exercising and one non-exercise attack.
The cardiologist diagnosed atrial fibrillation and put me on flecainde 50mg twice per day and junior aspirin. This greatly improved things. Prior to medication I had reached the point where any run triggered an attack. With the flecainide I only had 1-2 per week. Also the max pulse readings were lower (190 against 230 non flecainide) but still above my normal max.
The flecainide was increased to 100mg twice per day and this stopped the exercise attacks but I still got attacks when resting. During these attacks my resting pulse rose from 42 to between 110-140.
Had another monitor for 5 days and recorded some of these bouts which were diagnosed as atrial flutter. Having researched this I still don't understand the difference between flutter and fibrillation but it would appear you can suffer from both. Cardiologist wanted me to go onto a low dose beta blocker and replace the aspirin with warfarin. I turned this down and was sent to Kings College Hospital in London for ablation.
Was offered to types of ablation. The first takes about an hour and only fixes the flutter (similar to what Tony Blair had done). The second would fix both if successful (might take more than one attempt) and takes 4-6 hrs with an overnight stay. I've opted for the full monty.
I need to be on warfarin for 4-6 wks prior to the procedure and have an anticlot injection daily for a couple of weeks after.
Corinthian/DR Dan which procedure did you have and were you awake or under a GA.
Thought I'd just add some background info in case anyone else reads this forum and is on the same "journey". In hindsight I first started getting symptom about 3-4 years ago. I had the occasional bad race or training session. I originally had a polar monitor but because I was getting funny readings (or so I thought) bought a garmin 305. I still got the problem and after trying cutting myself inhalf by having the strap so tight, adding cooking salt to my saliva when wetting the electrodes and even buying ecg gel to improve it gave up wearing it. I thought either that they were either too unreliable, too much interference or I didn't have enough body fat for conductivity. Anyway I managed to get 2 silver medals at the UK Indoor Masters Champs so things couldn't have been too bad.
From Oct 2009 to December 2009 my racing results became terrible and I was running a good 5 minutes slower in cross country races than normal. I seemed to be totally knackered after only a few minutes running. I went to see my GP who did an ECG and blood test. The only thing he could find was I was borderline hypertensive although whenever I checked this at home it is always OK. I was put on 10mg Lisinopril and which I'm still on.
Things gradually improved and I thought the Lisinopril were doing the trick as by March I was running 29-02 (5 miles), 37-12 (10k), 60-48 (10miles) which are respectable times for my age (I've just turned 56) and got the silver medal in the UK Masters 10000m Track Champs. Things did not go as well on the track. I ran 64 for 400m, 2-19 800m, 4-50 1500m and 10-14 3000m. These were all down on what I would have expected. Also I was tying up so badly at the end of races I could barely keep on my feet. It didn't matter whether I went out hard or tried to run even splits I always felt the same. In one 3000m race I ran the first 5 laps in 80's and then struggled to finish running 90 and 97 for the last 2. I put this down to lactic intolerance and unsuccessfully changed my training to try and overcome it. Normally at track meets I would run an 800m and either a 400m or 1500m followed by leg of the 4x400. Last year I was hardly recovering between events.
After one track session I don't know how I managed to drive home as my pulse started racing and I felt really light headed. I had several other attacks which started about an hour or so after training and I found my BP would be very low 96/55. I thought this was due to the lisinopril and stopped taking them thinking the raised pulse was due to the low BP and not vice versa. This had no effect.
I joined Fetcheveryone and as you could download direct from my Garmin I started recording my pulse again. At first I only started getting a problem with high intensity interval sessions. This slowly spread to hard runs and so on until eventually anything that required a fairly quick change of pulse (both up and down) triggered it. The rest is as per my previous posts.
Since researching this I have found a paper by a Dr. Andreas Wolf which shows an increased occurrence of atrial fibrillation among masters endurance athletes something my consultant conferred see link below :-
www.heartrhythmcongress.com/.../AFAPatients1215_A_Wolff.pdf.
Hopefully this might help anyone who is having same problems.
Egholm ... the surgery is minor ajnd was not at all scary. I'd have the op again if the SVT returned.
mm ...as I understand it, fibrillation can often be triggered by the SVT ("flutter") ... so ablating the flutter can reduce/stop the fibrillation. I had flutter ... it was a done with a local. Corinthian had fibrillation as I recall.
I've run 1200 miles since my op last summer and have had no issues at all.
Started warfarin on 5/2/2011 and ablation scheduled for 13/4/2011. I've been told the procedure will take at least 4hrs and could be up to 6hrs and will be under a general anaesthetic. I go in on 12th and hopefully will be out on 14th.
Training greatly reduced. Farthest runs are 5 miles @ 8min miling. Had 2 bouts during the last 10 days but the flecanide is certainly helping (only seen a jump from 130 to 204). Also had one non exercise related bout which actually woke me up at 4-30am and lasted a couple of hours.
No ... I just had a normal echocardiogram.
Good that you've got a date for the ablation!
I'm following this thread with interest. At the end of Jan I had a VF cardiac arrest just after finishing a race in which according to my HRM I clearly had a SVT attack. Two days after my urgent bypass, whilst I was still in the high dependency unit, I had a prolonged SVT attack which they had to treat with drug infusions. On my discharge letter it says 'SVT 180 - atrial flutter'.
I have had SVT attacks before, usually only lasting a few seconds, but this evidence makes me wonder whether they were more dangerous than I previously thought. I have it down on my list of questions for my surgical review plus a print off of the race HRM trace.
I am currently on Amiodarone to control irregularities in the heart; in the longer term they want to fit an ICD in my chest. No-one mentioned ablations to me but maybe its not appropriate in my case.
If you had to have a bypass, it presumably means you had some structural issues with your heart. If so, then that's a whole lot more complciated that an electrical issue. I'm not a clinician, so I don't really know.
It sounds very much like the problems that I originally experienced about 4-5 years ago. At that time the increase was similar to the levels you are experiencing and didn't seem to have any adverse effect.
It's worth getting it checked out and keeping an eye on. Don't just blame the pulse monitor.
My date has been brought forward to 30th March now.
That sounds exactly what I've got, Soupy. Exercise induced atrial tachycardia. It takes a while to happen, for me that is running hard for about 40-50 minutes, stops as soon as you stop running but comes back quickly if you start running again.
To reassure you... it isn't dangerous so you're very unlikely to drop dead from it. It can be treated but I've chosen not to because the risks outweigh the benefits. I manage it by always using a HR monitor when I'm exercising and avoiding the type of session that is likely to trigger it.
Can you print out the output from your HR monitor? If you can, take it when you see the doc as evidence of what it happening.
My experience is similar to Dr Dan's. It was just a feeling of feeling knackered and my pace dropped about 1.5 minutes per mile for the same amount of effort and I sweat a lot more. It could take anything from 15 min to 2hrs to return to normal. During this time it is in the 140-150 zone. Then again it has reverted to normal during the run. On one long run it came on after 45 mins, lasted 20 mins during which time it felt really hard work running then cleared itself and I was fine for the rest of the run. If it stays high for any period of time when I finish exercise my blood pressure goes low and it makes me feel faint.
According to the consultants I have seen, the main risk appears to be of clots forming in the heart due to it not emptying properly and hence the risk of strokes. Also the consultants tell me that in time the problem will get worse and you could stay in AF which then places strain on the heart.
I guess it depends on how bad the condition is. I've been taking flecainide for 6 months and have only had a few attacks since while running and haven't really experienced any side effects. I've also been taking a junior aspirin. It has not however stopped the non exercise related bouts of AF which have in anything increased (on average 2-3 week).
Initially I only had the attacks during interval sessions but over time this changed to just about anything that changed my heartrate including running down hills or not warming down after a hard session.
Thanks for you responses. A lot of this sort of fits with what I've experienced. I've never been fast but my pace suddenly dropped from 11min/miles to puffing to do 12min/miles. I started HR training to try and get some pace back but it might be more complicated than that.
Mr W - I thought I'd remembered you saying something about this and thanks for the reassurance. I've got a GP appointment in 2 weeks' time (earliest there is - pah!) and in the mean time I'll stick to < 70%. My HRM only retains an average for each split so it doesn't record individual spikes but I'll I note down all the info I've got. I might even buy a new monitor that gives more accurate information and sell the one I have now. Can anyone recommend one that gives a printout and records actual HR? I've got a Suunto T4c at the moment which wasn't cheap but I might need to upgrade.
But the million dollar question of course is ..........I wonder if I can still do the marathon on 10 April???
I use a garmin 305 and upload my data to the garmin website. I use the Vista snipping tool to create a snapshot for printing.
I took a readout along to my GP and to the cardiologist. I then had a monitor on for 5 days twice which recorded the events both exercise induced and non-exercise induced.
With regards to running a marathon you'll have to be guided by your GP. I personally wouldn't want to run for 4+ hours while in AF (I found 10k while in AF totally knackering). The only other option I guess is to drop out if you have an attack.
good luck mm, I will keep an eye on this thread.
I have the same condition and like yourself have flecainide twice day which I increase to an extra tablet if I have a crappy day (like yesterday!). I had two conditions, Wolf Parkinson White which I had the op for (just a local anaesthetic that took about an hour) and was a success but was recommended medicaton rather than the more risky op for the VT condition.
Reading your history in your post sounds familiar. I am an astoundingly one-paced runner! the slightest attempt to up my pace and I blow out very quickly. Really frustrating especially at 51 as it feels like some kind of artificial barrier is in the way. Sometimes I think f*** it and would quite happily have the op tomorrow if my consultant said so. I see him in a couple of weeks time.
Good luck mate : )