As Always This Group is a GREAT resource and its inputs MUCH appreciated --
First question: I have a 70 year old friend who has been in permanent afib for several years but without too many symptoms. He finally agreed to get cardio converted to see
how he might feel in SR (if the conversion took for a few days or more). No luck converting and they tell him they noticed his pulse rate is lower than it used to be (now it is around 40).They are hinting at a pacemaker...my question is should my friend be considering an ablation and what Dr's do quite a few ablations on permanent afibbers in Boston. Is this sort of info available anywhere?
Second question: This is about me -- Before starting to take Flec, I had Afib 1 - 2 times a month for 2-4 hours starting late 2007.. I was very symptomatic. Also, I had an apparent pause when converting......... in the Spring of 2008 I had a pacemaker put in in case I ever where to get a pause again, In the summer of 2010 I reluctantly agreed to try flecainide as I was starting to get afib episodes more like once a week.For the past 2 years on the Flec,, I have had very few episodes (2-4 a year) all very short.
This week I had a 24 hr plus episode -- a long one for me. It may have come about because I took my flec early (50mg at 6:30 AM and then my other dose (100mg at 11:30 PM) and because I had a high stress day. At any rate, I went to hospital after 24 hours to find out my pacemaker (5 years old) had not much battery and it's chip was not confirming my latest episode (probably) because it was in a weaker mode run. Now I am getting new pacemaker tomorrow (hopefully existing leads good)
My question, when someone on flec already goes more than say 12 hours in an episode mode, does their Dr sometimes suggest they up their Flec at that very moment hoping to prevent a longer episode which might become a situation that could need a cardio convert attempt?
Thanks!
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/26/2012 08:33PM by tibbar.
