Trial and error ???

I have had my Dfib/PM installed since July 10 2007 at first I was able to do some things cleaning moving light items occasionally bend over to pick things up. Aprox a month ago i was washing my truck at a coin car wash being in a slight hurry to beat the clock my defib went off 3 times. They put me on Amiodarone(pacerone) 600 mg a day my heart arithmea now gets so bad that I have to drink water to calm my self down then it went off 5 times at the ER a couple of weeks later the defib was check found to be good however was not programed for a pulse under 60 (from what i was told) they also ran an IV of the pacerone aprox 1440 mg and said to cotinue what I had been taken. Feeling ok I started working around the house nothing heavy defib went off again so now they added mexiletine 150mg 3x a day along with everything else I'm taking. 1 has anyone run into this or is this normal 2 is it common to do the take the med and wait and see attiude

1 Comments

meds and trial & error

by Vai - 2007-10-16 01:10:15

Sounds like you have or your condition is leading to some sort of persistent afib. (I assume its afib). The docs must have a good reason to prescribed such a strong dosage of amioderone coupled with other drugs.

I have several years of experience with the drug amiodarone. It was the drug of choice to suppress afib and I took it for about 2 years. The side effects (liver damage) became evident and I was took off the drug. I was given betaloc as a substitute. It was not as effective but adequate marginally.

Then I had a bad period where the afibs became intense and frequent. The doctor took an aggressive approach to suppress the afib with amioderone + sotalol but only for a short period under his regular monitoring. As soon as I stabilize, the amiodarone was taken off.

With your PM in place, your doctors could actually be aggressive to try various meds to suppress the afibs so you need to work with them. Read the literature on the net to improve your understanding and record how you're feeling with each day or change in meds. Show the doc and tell him how you responded to each change.

Also during this tiime, get as much rest as possible and drink plenty of fluids. It helps.

Today I am only on maintenance dosage of sotalol and with my PM set up at lower 60 bpm and upper 140 bpm, rate response turned off. My afib load is down to 2% and am 93% atrial paced and < 1% ventricle paced.

Wish you luck.

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Member Quotes

The pacer systems are really very reliable. The main problem is the incompetent programming of them. If yours is working well for you, get on with life and enjoy it. You probably are more at risk of problems with a valve job than the pacer.