Yesterday I went in for my 8 month checkup..I died during my EP study and zapped back....I have less than 30% Ejection Fraction, a 100% occluded right main coranary artery, 40% occluded left main coranary artery, & Guidant dual chamber pacemaker w/ 2 wire ICD. Anyway, at the followup yesterday he said I have had 3 paced events since implantation, The first time was 2 weeks after implant @ 3 am, the second was in mid may @ 10:30 pm, and the third time just last month in june @ 1:05 am. Now I'm concerned because it's happened 2 months in a row, and the last 2 monts at that.

All three times I was asleep, I had my lung doctor check for sleep apnea, nope, that's not it.. Are dreams upsetting my heart rythmn? Not breathing enough while asleep and heart is starving for air, setting off irregular rythmn?

He said it's happening to often [3 times in 8 months] and set my settings to be more sensitive. just curious, does that mean the Tazer settting?? I'm just not going to sleep anymore!!
Zombie,

 

 

That is scary. My heart stopped 3 times while in the hospital, about 3 weeks ago.Always happened in the a.m. while I was sleeping. Showed up on the monitor they put on you, it showed up on that.Had to have emergency surgery, dr said that I would not make it out of the hospital. How can they tell when it happened. Does the device keep a record and they can check itI am new to all this. What do they do when they check you. All so new to me. Did your zap any time that you noticed, & is it scary? Sorry for all the questions, mine was implanted on July 11th. Good luck to you, & take care of yourself.

 

Isn't the pacemaker/ICD implanted to pace when needed? What is the difference between a "paced event" and the pacemaker doing it's job? What is the difference between a "paced event" and patients who pace at 100%? Isn't that why we have these devices? Smitty, Frank, can you shed some light?
Bambi

 

Bambi, My paced events as explained to me by my EP.
Yes in a since I am 100% dependant on having the ICD to be there in case I need it. If you read above I'm at high risk for SCD,heart attack, & stroke. Anyway, My 3 events that were paced, meant the pacemakers [ I have the upper and lower pacemakers] realized my heart was out of rythmn heading for failure. So the pacemakers take over and pace my heart back into rythmn before the defibrilator knocks the ___ out of me to reset the rythmn. So far, the pacemakers have been succesful in returning a normal rythmn in about 13 seconds +/- each time. Which is a good thing , the Doc. said the ZAPPER is set to lite up my life in about 15 seconds. I sure don't want to wake up @ 2am feeling like a mule kicked me.
Rayan, First off I have not been zapped YET, I have a latitude home heart monitor hooked up to a phone line at home. I test myself every Monday, my AICD records everything but blood pressure, it does record what type of event [atrial, v-fib, tachy, etc.]
heart rate before-during-and after the event, what minute, hour, and day it happened, how long it happened, where at in the heart upper or lower. It's a really COOL device, would have loved inventing it, instead of needing it.
ZOMBIE,