Facts/Experiences regarding "heart problems"

In My Humble Opinion
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Preface # 1: I was not sure if this post should be placed here or in “IMHO” as I do want some solid information but moderators please do as you see fit.
Preface # 2: I know you guys are - mostly - not doctors, just solid for some solid real world feedback outside of the literature I keep finding.

OK, I am a 46 year old male of average health. I play basketball and run at the gym a few times a week but am still a “bigger” guy at 6-1 and 255 and could definitely stand to lose 30-40lbs. Not a gym rat by any means. I do not smoke, never have, do not eat red meat, very VERY light alcohol (a beer on game day at most) but I do drink caffeine like it I breathe air (at least 2 large cups in the morning and a coconut water kickstarter midday (estimating at least 200-300mg a day).

I have a “super cush” tech job that allows me to sit on my rear all day, although i started using a stand up desk a few days a week about 45 days ago. I do take a lot of supplements daily, omega 3s, B12, CoQ10, a multi, resveratrol, potassium and magnesium.

OK so my problem…

About 8 days ago, while lying in bed for the night, i felt my heart skip a beat and take my breath away. When feeling my pulse (65 bpm) my pulse would actually STOP for that second of fluttering… this scared the $^@% out of me and i literally wondered if i was going to die right then and there! My heart proceeded to continue these episodes of “fluttering” with different levels from very minor to very noticeable all through the night and off and on for the next several days.

I being a stupid “guy” waited a full 5 days to go to the doctor, but eventually I felt it was bad enough that I made an appointment. When my doctor was full that day i asked to see someone/anyone in their office with an MD in front of their name :smiley:

After being looked at by a Dr, I was told it likely PVC’s (premature ventricular contractions) and that they are generally normal and not anything to worry about. After my insistence that this was not normal and I was scared as hell, they sent me over to the hospital for a full workup that included checking my blood and urine for “heart attack” enyzmes and proteins, took chest x-rays and put me on an EKG and monitored me for several hours.

There findings were that while they saw SEVERAL of these PVC’s during my stay (over a dozen), that my x-rays showed nothing (not sure what it would show) and that my urine and blood showed no signs of having a heart attack previously. The doctor came in and insisted this was a no big deal and that EVERYONE gets these but some people are more apt to notice them than others. He did tell me to lay off the caffeine (which i have for 2 days now) and prescribed me Xanax to sleep.

He also said they will either:

A) go away completely
B) lessen to the point i do not notice them
or C) my brain will eventually just filter them out and i will not feel them

I should note that i never felt any “pain” or “numbing” with these, they just feel incredibly odd and send panic and Imminent death signals to my brain! :eek:

So has anyone else on the boards ever dealt with PVC’s like this and if so how did you deal with them? Did they eventually go away? Your stories and feedback are greatly appreciated. I have never once felt my mortality like this before and i am using this as a catalyst to make the best choices for my health moving forward.

Thank you!

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Did you share with the Dr’s the totality of supplements you take daily and the, ‘taking caffeine like breathing air’, part?

Also is the coconut water kickstarter, one of those high caffeine drinks, or just coconut water?

Did you have a sleep issue you failed to mention to us? Or did the Dr just volunteer the Xanax? That seems odd to me.

I don’t have any experience with the issues you’re facing but these are the questions your post made me curious about.

Good Luck, it sounds very unpleasant to me and I can totally see why you’re concerned!

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  • Yes the Dr is fully aware of my supplements, I believe it is a standard question they ask because I listed them all.

  • Yes the kickstarter is sort of an energy drink. In truth its more akin to a mountain dew than a monster but the Dr views them all as energy drinks and told me to stop drinking them and the coffee for a time.

  • I mentioned that these “feel” worse at night and keep me from sleeping. He kept telling me they were normal and i kept telling him normal people do not deal with this every night. He felt i had some anxiety about it which makes it worse and prescribed the xanax, which to be honest do help since I can get to sleep (but a whole one kicks my ass so i take 1/2).

I fully expect - at least sincerely hope - that the caffeine is the culprit. It seems strange that i could drink caffeine as i have for years with no issue and not it makes my heart grumpy but i will stop if it means not feeling like my heart is failing every single day! :eek:

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Moved to IMHO from General Questions.

samclem, moderator

5

I think it’s much more strange that you thought you could consume caffeine at this pace, ‘for years’, and there WOULDN’T be some health consequence!

How is that possible for a grown man?

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Let me make sure I understand what you are actually saying because you seem ill informed… you believe that it is so abnormal to drink 2-3 cups of coffee in the morning and a “soda” in the evening that you would make the above statement?

Perhaps i am indeed delusional, But I am pretty sure most “grown men” consume as much or more each day whether they realize it or not. I sure thought 10s or 100s of millions of people consumed AT LEAST two to three cups of coffee a day.

And for the record, a single 12 oz can of the kickstarter i drink has 68mg for the entire can whereas an 8oz cup of coffee has 95mg. I never perceived that 258mg of caffeine a day was a health risk.

In fact according to the mayo clinic:

Up to 400 milligrams (mg) of caffeine a day appears to be safe for most healthy adults. That’s roughly the amount of caffeine in four cups of brewed coffee, 10 cans of cola or two “energy shot” drinks.

cite - Caffeine: How much is too much? - Mayo Clinic

7

I went through that in my 40’s about 25 years ago. Mine lasted for about a year. I think I traced mine back to light marijuana usage. I stopped the pot and the heart beat went back to normal. Scary as hell.

8

yes, I have one of those every once in a while. also called an “ectopic beat.”

9

But surely you, and the coffee drinking world at large, actually are aware as soon as any heart issue arises the very first thing that happens is stop caffeine.

Sorry, I thought the connection between caffeine consumption and heart issues was very widely known, perhaps I misunderstand it.

10

Ever since my bypass surgery, I get these all the time. So much so that I take more beta blocker (prescribed for high blood pressure) to tame them a bit.

When they first started up, and every so often now, they get to be alarming. My first thought was that my heart’s behavior could degenerate into something a bit more fatal like fibrillation.

A lot of people have PVCs and never notice them. One thing you can do to help is to cut down or eliminate caffeine. Simply drinking half-decaf could be enough to help a lot.

Your doctor may also prescribe a beta blocker.

Mine usually happen when I am horizontal and trying to sleep, but they don’t alarm me nearly as bad as they used to.

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YES! lying down is when I notice them most. I have stopped coffee altogether and am limiting my caffeine to just one 12 oz of soda in the morning which is only 68mg of caffeine.

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I’ve had PVCs for 30 years. Sometimes I can go months without one, and then I’ll get a “swarm” of them where I loose track of how many I had that day. I’ve never been able to correlate them with any change in diet or exercise.
I work out 5 days/week - 30 minutes on the stairstepper, and it doesn’t seem to make any difference with the frequency of the PVCs. My Cardiologist says to ignore them.

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My cardiologist says the same, though they are tough to ignore when trying to sleep. For me, they are not really alarming any more, and certainly not painful, but they are uncomfortable and distracting.

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Did you go to a regular doctor or a cardiologist?

If the former, go see a cardiologist.

An acquaintance of mine had the exact same symptoms. His regular doctor did some tests, blood, etc. and found nothing. A cardio doc had him do a stress test and then a cath and found significant blockage in 2 arteries! :confused:

He was told that the fluttering feeling can be caused by the heart having to work harder getting blood through the clogged arteries. After bypass surgery the skipped beats stopped completely.

This is not medical advice, I am not a doctor. But why flirt with something that could kill you?

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In the absence of associated symptoms*, palpitations (a sense of isolated flip flop beats of the heart) are almost never dangerous. And, I am tempted to say ‘never’. So, I would not recommend getting another opinion from a cardiologist.

BTW, are you sure they were “PVCs” (as in premature ventricular contractions) and not APBs (atrial premature beats/contractions)? The latter is much more common in younger people, especially those who drink coffee, etc.

*chest pain, shortness of breath, fainting

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That is very common.

When we’re lying down, there tend to be fewer distractions taking our minds off it and, as well, the surface on which we’re resting can ‘reflect’ the vibration of the PVC back toward the body making it more pronounced. This is especially the case if lying on the left side.

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My friend had NONE of those. The palpitations in and of themselves may not pose a risk, but his cardio team said they were caused by something that was and that he was on the edge of a massive heart attack.

The OP is concerned enough to go to a doctor and open a thread on it. I’m only relaying a story I know about them. How on Earth is him getting another opinion going to hurt? Having a skipped beat now and again appears to be normal. But if they are consistently happening that isn’t.

18

I am on thyroid replacement medication, and I get these when I am over-replaced. It’s a pretty common symptom of that.

Having said that, your doctor probably knows what he’s talking about.

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I had these for many years, sometimes several within the same minute. This was regardless of my caffeine intake, which ranged from zero to quite a bit. Then I had triple bypass (and valve replacement) surgery, and they are reduced to maybe one every 1-2 months. Mine were totally harmless, but you should really see a cardiologist to be sure.

20

Possibly via its cost, performance of unnecessary testing, and, depending on the cardiologist visited, an unnecessary surgery as well. He has already had a work-up. If he now sees a cardiologist, it’s the “if all you have is a hammer everything is a nail” issue. The cardiologist may feel the need to do what he/she knows to do: stress tests, echos, and, alas, heart caths.

Not normal does not = diseased. It means they are not *felt *by the majority of people. They could still be present in “normal” people (and are). Even if not present in “normal” people, the sensation of single skipped beats (flip flops of the heart beat, PVCs, PABs), is NOT associated with heart disease.

Regarding your friend, middle age men (esp with other risk factors) might do well to have stress tests in general. The presence of single beat palpitations, though, should not make a difference whether they get such a test or not. Finding significant coronary disease in a man who got a stress test because of the presence of single beat palpitations was a coincidence.

What you say IS true for people who have runs of consecutive PVCs/PABs OR who have symptoms (angina, shortness of breath, and especially fainting) with their palpitations.