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Is It Possible To Have Heart Arrhythmia Without Having Decreased Or Increased Heartbeats?
Question: Is it possible to have heart arrhythmia without having decreased or increased heartbeats? For example, can I experience A FIb without symptoms of a racing heart?
Brief Answer:
I would explain as follows
Detailed Answer:
Hello,
Regarding your concern, it is quite possible to have cardiac arrhythmia with a normal heart rate.
This means that you can have skipped heart beats, which do not alter the mean heart rate.
But, you should also know that these types of cardiac arrhythmia are usually associated with symptoms like shortness of breath, palpitations, dizziness, etc.
You can catch them by closely monitoring your pulse, although the heart rate is not high or low.
Regarding atrial fibrillation, it may be paroxysmal and when lasting for some seconds, it may not cause any significant increase in the heart rate. So, it is quite possible.
Anyway, I would like to know your symptoms.
If you experience any of the above mentioned symptoms (shortness of breath, palpitations) time after time, I would recommend performing some tests in order to investigate for possible cardiac arrhythmia:
- An ambulatory 24-48 hours ambulatory ECG monitoring to examine your heart rhythm trends for a prolonged time and investigate for possible cardiac arrhythmia
- A cardiac ultrasound to examine your heart function and structure
- Thyroid hormone levels for thyroid gland dysfunction
- Complete blood count for anemia
- Blood electrolytes for possible imbalances.
If these episodes are rare, a prolonged Holter (one month) or a loop recorder would be more helpful to detect possible episodes of cardiac arrhythmia.
You should discuss with your doctor on the above tests.
Hope you will find this answer helpful! I remain at your disposal for any further questions whenever you need!
Regards,
Dr. Iliri
I would explain as follows
Detailed Answer:
Hello,
Regarding your concern, it is quite possible to have cardiac arrhythmia with a normal heart rate.
This means that you can have skipped heart beats, which do not alter the mean heart rate.
But, you should also know that these types of cardiac arrhythmia are usually associated with symptoms like shortness of breath, palpitations, dizziness, etc.
You can catch them by closely monitoring your pulse, although the heart rate is not high or low.
Regarding atrial fibrillation, it may be paroxysmal and when lasting for some seconds, it may not cause any significant increase in the heart rate. So, it is quite possible.
Anyway, I would like to know your symptoms.
If you experience any of the above mentioned symptoms (shortness of breath, palpitations) time after time, I would recommend performing some tests in order to investigate for possible cardiac arrhythmia:
- An ambulatory 24-48 hours ambulatory ECG monitoring to examine your heart rhythm trends for a prolonged time and investigate for possible cardiac arrhythmia
- A cardiac ultrasound to examine your heart function and structure
- Thyroid hormone levels for thyroid gland dysfunction
- Complete blood count for anemia
- Blood electrolytes for possible imbalances.
If these episodes are rare, a prolonged Holter (one month) or a loop recorder would be more helpful to detect possible episodes of cardiac arrhythmia.
You should discuss with your doctor on the above tests.
Hope you will find this answer helpful! I remain at your disposal for any further questions whenever you need!
Regards,
Dr. Iliri
Above answer was peer-reviewed by :
Dr. Chakravarthy Mazumdar
There ar a couple of symptoms that happen. One of the most recurrent is when I am asleep, I wake up with a racing heartbeat. Between 140-160 BPM. The heart seems out of rhythm and it becomes a bit hard to catch my breath. After doing some research online, I started to do valsalva and it helped to reset the beats where I would hold my breath for 8 seconds then exhale. So far, that has worked time and time again. This type of episode also happens when I exercise and I haven't been able to exercise since because I am psychologically afraid. I feel skipped heart beats once in a while and very rarely I'll feel out of breath when these happen and it only lasts a few seconds. I had a stress test in 2014 and it came back normal. That is around the time the first skipped beats started to happen. I had a Holt monitor but nothing came of that of concern. These other symptoms have more recent starting around early 2017. I don't recall much chest pain but I have GERD so sometimes I don't know whether it is the stomach or the heart. What could possibly be some causes of the elevated heart reate. I have to be honest and say that of course these worries me to some extent and sometimes causes anxiety that it can be something very serious like VFIB :(. Faleminderit per kohen tende (Thanks for your time)
Brief Answer:
My opinion as follows
Detailed Answer:
Hi,
The fact that your symptoms improved by Valsalva maneuver, indicates that the autonomic nervous system is playing an important role in these episodes.
Coming to this point, it may be necessary to make a clinical differential diagnosis between a normal sinus tachycardia and a possible supraventricular arrhythmia.
You should know that anxiety, caffeine, or physical activity can activate the sympathetic nervous system, leading to a similar clinical scenario, which is more prominent in susceptible and sensitive patients.
Anyway, I agree with you on the fact that we can not conclude that it is just anxiety and exclude any possible cardiac arrhythmia, just based on the fact that your Holter monitoring has resulted normal.
For this reason, I would recommend discussing with your cardiologist on the possibility of having a loop recorder, which is a more accurate tool to help 'catch' rare episodes of arrhythmia, which can not be registered by a normal Holter monitoring.
I would also recommend performing the above mentioned blood lab tests, in order to exclude a possible metabolic disorder (like anemia, thyroid gland dysfunction or electrolyte imbalance), which can trigger this clinical situation.
Hope to have clarified some of your uncertainties! If you have any other questions, please don't hesitate to ask me again! Wishing all the best.
Dr. Iliri
My opinion as follows
Detailed Answer:
Hi,
The fact that your symptoms improved by Valsalva maneuver, indicates that the autonomic nervous system is playing an important role in these episodes.
Coming to this point, it may be necessary to make a clinical differential diagnosis between a normal sinus tachycardia and a possible supraventricular arrhythmia.
You should know that anxiety, caffeine, or physical activity can activate the sympathetic nervous system, leading to a similar clinical scenario, which is more prominent in susceptible and sensitive patients.
Anyway, I agree with you on the fact that we can not conclude that it is just anxiety and exclude any possible cardiac arrhythmia, just based on the fact that your Holter monitoring has resulted normal.
For this reason, I would recommend discussing with your cardiologist on the possibility of having a loop recorder, which is a more accurate tool to help 'catch' rare episodes of arrhythmia, which can not be registered by a normal Holter monitoring.
I would also recommend performing the above mentioned blood lab tests, in order to exclude a possible metabolic disorder (like anemia, thyroid gland dysfunction or electrolyte imbalance), which can trigger this clinical situation.
Hope to have clarified some of your uncertainties! If you have any other questions, please don't hesitate to ask me again! Wishing all the best.
Dr. Iliri
Note: For further queries related to coronary artery disease and prevention, click here.
Above answer was peer-reviewed by :
Dr. Chakravarthy Mazumdar
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