Most Recent Messages in Surgery & Recovery

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Confused! Surgery is in 4 days!

I have been having some health issues for about 2 years now. It started dizziness, short of breath, passing out, heart rate dropping. My hemoglobin was 5.1, so a year and a half ago I received blood transfusions. I felt a little better, but still had troubles. My cardiologist has been there through all of this. She has ran holter monitors, 30 day monitors, tilt tests, eeg's, ekg's, etc. I have been taking 15 pills a day to regulate everything. Finally, in December I did the tilt test and...

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pace maker

I had my pace maker put in on 3-11-2010. They started the surgery and 8:50 am and at 10:00 am I was eating cookies and talking to my mother on my cell phone. I was ready to go home but my dr wanted me to stay over night

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Doing well

Hi all
I am 10 days into this "best new friend" thing and feeling quite well. Just wanted to share, that this morning I took my 96 year old Mother into the hospital where she had her 11 year old pacemaker changed. Will be picking her up in about an hour to take her home to where she lives. Amazing heh, 96! Gives me lots of hope that these electronic things we are all carrying around inside us really do good things for us with these heart problems. All the best to each of you.
Howard

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Hi

Hi everyone,
Im 21 and like a number of you on here (so i have read), have been told I need a pacemaker after fainting episodes. My heart also stopped for 20 seconds during tilt table test a few weeks ago.
I am going in on friday and am getting really really nervous! Was just wondering if anyone would like to explain exactly what they do etc and about recovery. I am a party animal and enjoy sports and am really concerned that I will have to change my hobbies etc?!

I would r...

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1 MoNtH tOdAy!

Yipee! I made it one month. What a ride!

I have felt so many different emotions in this 1st month.

Shock- being told I had 2nd degree heart block that would surely get worse & could even turn to 3rd degree heart block...being told I needed a pacemaker. Those were both very hard for me. I was in denial for a bit...I went as far as to convince myself I really didn't need it. I could live without it. The doctor's could be wrong...maybe it wouldn't get worse.

Fear-...

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mechanical feeling/short of breath

Hello friends!

My PM went in the 23rd of February, it has been almost 4 weeks. When I went in for my initial interrogation at 2 weeks they said they would be lowering the voltage from 5 down to 2 at my 6 week appointment. When they did the interrogation and made the PM work I felt it quite strongly. I had been feeling it since it was implanted & was relieved that it was the PM working, not something to be concerned about. I have been told I will get used to it. I'm not. It is heavy &...

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Replacement soon

Hi all.

This is my first time here. I had a dual chamber, rate responsive pacemaker implanted in 1997 (at age 19) and it is time to have it replaced. But, as far as I can tell (I'll know more next month) my leads do not need to be replaced.

I was told at the time that most people go back to work within a few days after having their pacemaker implanted. However, my first surgery kept me in quite a bit of pain for 2 months and I had a very hard time moving my left arm...

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Replacement leads from pm

Hello everyone.
I have not been on here for sometime now, been busy with son and partner being poorly, but nevertheless I still think about you all. I have a query and that is I have had 2 pm's and maybe due for another replacement soon. They left the old wires in and inserted another 2 wires, should I need to have anymore wires, how much space left for wires to be implanted. Sounds complicated, hope you good friends can understand me. Take care all of you
Sue

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struggling-skip if u want happy

Hmmm...today is my day for self pity. It was 3 weeks yesterday, my energy level is a bit better but what the hell does it matter? It hurts so bad today, feels like my skin is being ripped apart. I lubed it up well with Vitamin E & emu oil, that helped with the tight feeling on the surface, but every time I move my arm it feels as if my chest is going to rip open.

I wanted to go out last night, but I am sure it is a bad idea. I hate the bar scene anyway so it is really a mind boggling...

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Just had my PM implanted 2 days ago

So I just had my PM implanted 2 days ago, and I am feeling a variety of things, excited that I may finaly havea normal life again, overwhelmed, I have 2 lil ones that are not cooperating and hubby works a lot and i am in pain, I have lots of questions, no answers, scared, uhmm lots of things. I was diagnosed with bradycardia back in June, but my card. seems to think I have had this probelm for a few yrs. I would drop down to the low 40's even 30's at times, pass out in strange places, very lat...

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new pain

My PM went in on the 23rd. It will be 3 weeks on Tuesday. I am having some pretty intense pain on the inside where the leads attach to the PM. I am farely thin & you can see the bumps where they attach. It is a constant 3 on the pain scale that jumps to a 6 or a 7 when I move sometimes or when it is bumped. There is no swelling, redness, pus, or anything that would show signs of infection. It is just very tender on the inside, and only on the edge where the leads attach to the PM, the rest of it...

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average # of years post implant

Has anyone researched the average # of years patients live post surgical implant? Tried to access via the net and so far see between 3 to 8 years average for defib's.
Is there anyone out there that has a defib who has survived past 10 years? thanks M

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Scar Tissue and Checkups

My pacemaker was implanted October, 2009. Where the pacemaker was implanted, the skin/tissue is now raised along
that wound. It still itches a lot and often. Is there anything that will calm the itching? Otherwise, I am fine. Also, In April, I go in for my 6 months checkup. I am going in because when I had my 2 weeks check-up, the PM was fine. The clinician said she would send me out an instrument for monitoring so I would send my report in, via the instrument, in six months. She sh...

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Yuck...

Ok...surgery was Feb 8th and I have been doing so much better. I notice last night that the bottom of my incision is red again...and now this morning it looks like its abcessed???? I also still have a dissolvable (NOT) stitch sticking out at the top, but its not red????

Andrea

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Surgery Again

Hi out there. Just came home from my 3rd PM surgery since 12-28-09. I've posted on here since then regarding pain that I was experiencing. After having pain since the original surgery, second to reattach leads, and having consulted with my cardiologist we decided it best to go back in to see what was up. The only thing he could think of before this was that the stitches where attatched to the muscles and/or nerve tissue were pulling and thus causing the pain. He took out the PM repositione...

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FIBROMYALGIA AND RECOVERY

So it is now a little past one month from having my implant for 2nd degree AV block and bradycardia. So far, so good.

I am still having problems sleeping because of numbness in top of arm and side of breast. Doctor thinks it will just take some time to slowly go away. I also still have some bouts of dizziness/lightneadiness and my internist said that it may take the circulatory system a bit longer to get used to the pacemaker working. I am pacing 50% of the time, so I guess I just ha...

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Thanks. i'll have those chips baked not fried...

Watchya pacers!

Slightly sore chippy here, other than that feeling good. Wish you could all have the consultant that i've had....lovely guy. Brand spanking new guidant dual pm is now my new best friend....feel lucky to of come through the proceedure so much better than last time.Love to all ...never forgetting to thankyou....a chippier chippy signing outxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
And no i'm not on the loopy juice tonight. ....Had fun whilst having pm inserted though (in between the...

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feeling funny

My pm went in on the 23rd of February for a 2nd degree heart block & bradycardia. They also did an EP study, hoping for another ablation for my tachy, but weren't able to find the source. I am healing up well & recovery has been pretty good. I have 2 questions, though...

1st one~ It is still very hard to sleep...I end up on my left side or stomach multiple times a night-even with the giant pillow nest I create. Ideas? Tips? I am bruised again today, my bruise was a dime sized yellow...

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AV Node Ablation

I am 35 years old. I had open heart surger for atrial septal defect repair when I was 5. I was fine until 2006. Then I passed out and found out that I had bradycardia of 20 to 30 bpm. So I got a normal pacemaker implanted. I have since had 6 ablations for tachycardia and my pacemakers leads are not working properly. All of my ablations were a failure. None of them seemed to help my atrial tachycaridas. Now I went in for another check up and my doctor wants to extract my leads, put in a biventric...

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Feeling a bit strange..

I had my Medtronic PM implanted on 1-18-2010. Diagnosis was 3rd degree Heart Block. Overall things have been going pretty well although 1 week after surgery I had to make a mad dash to the clinic because my heart rate jumped to 130-140 and I was short of breath. That was resolved with a little adjustment of my PM and an addition of a beta blocker. For the past two days I have been experiencing an irregular heartbeat, that when I can feel it, causes me to cough. I have placed a call to the Dr...

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