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If you prefer to read about my conversation with Dr. Steve Ryan on this topic, the full unedited raw transcript is provided below.
Here are the highlights of our conversation:
There are two costs of living with atrial fibrillation: financial and quality of life costs. Both are very high!
Financial Costs
- Afib costs the United States about 6 billion each year.
- Medical costs for people who have afib are about $8,705 higher per year than per people who do not have afib.
- There are 750,000 hospitalizations each year because of afib.
Quality of Life Costs
- Atrial fibrillation is a disease, it’s a progressive disease that tends to get worse over time and wreck your life and wreck your heart.
- Frequent afib episodes enlarge and weaken your heart and can lead to other heart problems, including heart failure, and other cardiovascular problems.
- Afib is a progressive disease that eventually remodels your heart (changes how your heart works).
- Ongoing afib produces fibrosis, or permanent scarring of the heart.
- You’re losing 15% to 30% of your normal pumping ability of your heart when you’re in afib.
- Frequent or prolonged episodes of atrial fibrillation tend to stretch and dilate your left atrium. If it goes too far you lose contractual ability of your left atrium to function at all.
- If you leave someone in afib, the afib attacks tend to become longer and more frequent.
- One study showed that half the people who managed their afib with rate control drugs went into long-standing persistent afib within a year.
- Some of the other things that afib does is potentially cause dementia because you’re not getting enough blood to your brain and to the rest of your body.
- The goal should be to stop an afib episode NOT just control an episode (i.e. slow the heart rate while in afib).
- The problem with today’s anti-arrhythmic drugs is that they don’t work or if they do work for a time they lose their effectiveness eventually, or they have bad side effects.
- If you have persistent or long-standing persistent afib and have been told there is nothing that can be done other than take drugs to manage it, DON’T BUY IT! You have options!
- Castle AF Trial reveals ablations on heart failure patients resulted in a 47% reduction in death rates. In the catheter ablation group, 60% improved their ejection fraction by more than 35%! And after 5 years, 60% of the ablation group were in normal sinus rhythm compared to 22% receiving normal drug therapy.
- The goal for every afib patient should be to end their afib and not just manage it or tolerate it!
BEGIN TRANSCRIPT
Travis Van Slooten: I invited Dr. Steve Ryan back again for today’s episode of the afib podcast. Steve is a former patient who was cured of his back in April 1998 via catheter ablation. He is the publisher of one of the most popular websites, a-fib.com and he is the author of the best-selling book, Beat Your Afib: The Essential Guide to Finding Your Cure.
So in this episode Steve and I discussed a topic that we are both extremely passionate about. And that topic being “The Real Cost of Living with Atrial Fibrillation,” and why it’s imperative to seek a cure for your afib, rather than just living with your afib. The financial and quality of life cost of living with afib are absolutely staggering. And so in this episode we discussed those costs, and again we really emphasize why it’s so important to find a cure and not just settle with a life of afib. So with that, let’s roll the tape.
All right, Steve, our topic today is really near and dear to my heart – no pun intended – and I know it’s very near and dear to you as well. And I know when I’ve spoken with you in the past you and I are both very passionate about this topic, and it’s the topic of the real cost of living with atrial fibrillation. And of course, when we talked about the cost of living with afib — well, first of all, I should say when we say we’re living with afib, for most people that means they’re just tolerating it, they’re basically managing it as best as they can instead of trying to seek a cure. But the cost of doing that of just kind of tolerating your a favor rather than trying to see a cure, there are really two big cost there. There is the financial cost, but probably just as important, if not more important, is a health or quality of life cost.
Dr. Steve Ryan: Absolutely, yes.
Travis Van Slooten: Yeah, absolutely. So let’s talk about the financial costs, Steve. You found some interesting stats on the CDC website. Can you talk about these financial costs?
Dr. Steve Ryan: Yes, Travis. The CDC has some very interesting figures. Afib costs the United States about 6 billion each year. Medical costs for people who have afib are about $8,000 – and I’m reading from the CDC statement here – are about $8,705 higher per year than per people who do not have afib. Now who has $8,700 to throw around every year trying to cope with the…
Travis Van Slooten: Yeah, and unfortunately with the health care plans that are out there today a lot of people that won’t even meet their deductibles, so that usually probably out-of-pocket cost. Yeah, that’s on fortunate.
Dr. Steve Ryan: Yeah, it’s medication, it’s doctor visits, it’s ambulance, it’s trips to the ER it’s you know, all kinds of stuff goes into that that run up the bills cost. The CDC says there are 750,000 hospitalizations each year because of afib, and afib contributes to an estimated 130,000 deaths each year. The death rate from afib has a primary or a contributing cause of death as been rising for more than two decades. Now that’s because the more and more people are getting afib because it’s a condition of aging, but those are really staggering figures.
Travis Van Slooten: Yeah, tell me about it. And I can attest to those because until I seek my cure which was an ablation, those figures are actually pretty accurate. I mean I remember specifically one year I spent easily $8,000. My trip to the ER was $4,000 alone. Because it was my first episode and I was in an ambulance so the ambulance ride alone was like $1,500. I mean it was crazy, but the financial costs are unbelievable.
But what’s even scarier than the financial cost – and those are scary – is again the health and quality of life cost. And Steve this is where you and I really are passionate about this because I get — I cannot tell you Steve how many emails I get from people saying, “Well, my doctor says it’s no big deal, take these beta-blockers or take these rate control drugs, you know. It’s no big deal. We don’t need to fix it.” And a lot of times they’ll come to me and say, “Is that true?” Or I’ll get people that will say, “You know, my afib is really not that bad. When I have my episodes I’m a little winded but it’s no big deal, do I really need to think about having an ablation?” And I just want to cringe because it’s just like, ugh…
Dr. Steve Ryan: Same here.
Travis Van Slooten: You know it’s just like… So, Steve let’s talk about this. What are the health and quality of life issues that go into “living with afib“?
Dr. Steve Ryan: Well, it seems you and Travis, we both have had afib and we know how wonderful it feels to go from afib to normal sinus rhythm, and to feel wonderful, your body is alive again, you can do everything that you used to do. And leaving people in afib just makes no sense. Let’s say, I mean afib is a disease, it’s a progressive disease that tends to get worse over time and wreck your life and wreck your heart.
Let’s say someone had, God forbid, pancreatic cancer and the doctor told them, “Well, we’re just going to leave you in pancreatic cancer. We’re going to give you a few meds just to keep the pain away.” You look at that doctor and say, “You’re out of your mind.” Why leave someone’s heart in a disease state where you know they’re going to get worse and maybe eventually die from it? It makes no sense at all to me.
Travis Van Slooten: And I think part of the reason for this is with afib, you know, for some people when they have their episodes they don’t feel that bad, especially with people with silent or asymptomatic afib where they don’t really feel the episodes. But even if they have bad episodes, you know, for a lot of people they have an 8-hour, 10-hour episode that goes away and they’re good for another month, but I think what happens is they fail to realize the long-term picture here of what happens to your heart if it’s left in afib. So let’s talk about that. I think that’s the crux of the issue here is that people think “We’ll hey, it’s not that bad now,” but what they don’t realize is if you keep your heart in that states, as you talked about, down the road the end game is it could ultimately lead to heart failure. That’s the issue, right?
Dr. Steve Ryan: Yes, and many other things. Leaving people in afib is a death sentence. There’s all kinds of that document that. Here’s what afib does to you. Let’s say you give them the example of someone who has maybe a 10-hour episode once or twice a month. Having episodes like that enlarges and weakens your heart, and it leads to other heart problems and heart failure and cardiovascular problems. Afib, because it is a progressive disease it remodels your heart. I mean when we talk remodeling we’re saying your heart is changing permanently because of afib.
Now afib produces what is called fibrosis. Now fibrosis is if you look inside a heart you’d say smooth — in a normal heart you’d seem normal smooth heart tissue. It looks very healthy and red and everything is proper. When the heart becomes fibrotic, that smooth heart tissue turns into fibrous tissue. It turns it to basically dead tissue. There’s no transport function, there is no nerve going through, there’s no contraction. It’s dead. It’s like having dead tissue in your heart. And that’s what afib produces. And unfortunately, even though many of the remodeling effects of afib can be corrected by a catheter ablation, fibrosis is usually irreversible.
Now the other thing that afib does because when your heart is functioning normally, the atria, the upper part of your heart squeezes down, squeezes blood down into your ventricles and the ventricles and sends the blood to the lungs.
In afib instead of that squeezing down, that pumping down blood…if you look in your heart your heart is fibrillating, it’s vibrating it’s quivering, it’s not pumping properly. I mean, you’re losing 15 to 30% of your normal pumping ability of your heart. And this action tends to stretch and dilate your left atrium. If it goes too far you lose contractual ability of your left atrium to function at all.
And obviously if you leave someone in afib, the afib attacks tend to become longer and more frequent. There’s been a study where they followed people who developed afib for a year and they were just on rate control meds to control the heart from beating too fast, but leave them in afib, almost half within a year went into a chronic all-the-time afib (long standing persistent atrial fibrillation). Yeah, so the odds are really — I guess a lot of people don’t…I mean, how many people stay in paroxysmal occasional afib for years but the odds are against them.
Travis Van Slooten: I was one of those. I went 8 years, and then it was the 8th year where it spiraled out of control and became a weekly thing, and at that point I put the brakes on that and I had my ablation.
Dr. Steve Ryan: Yeah, good for you. And some of the other things that afib does is because you’re not getting enough blood to your brain to the rest of your body, people tend to develop dementia.
I’ve heard people describe being in afib like they’re in a brain fog. You know, they go to work and they can function. Things they used to do, no problem, all of a sudden they can’t even remember what they’re doing or how to do it. Or they used to speak a foreign language now they can’t anymore because they’re in afib.
One doctor gave at a conference gave an amazing example. His patient would be talking to him normally like a normal patient, he would go into afib and he could no longer talk. That’s the kind of thing that happens with afib. It just has really bad effects over time, and to leave people in afib like that is a death sentence – all too often.
Travis Van Slooten: And so what do you tell the person that again, they go to the doctor they have paroxysmal afib, which is just occasional episodes here and there that end on their own. They go to their doctor, they’re newly diagnosed — let’s say they’re, I don’t know, let’s say they’re 50 years old they’ve had one episode and so they go in the diagnosed “Yep, yep paroxysmal afib,” and the doctor typically in this scenario is going to say, “You’re fine for now. Here’s are some beta blockers,” or maybe “here’s a pill-in-the-pocket or whatever.” So that person will come to me or probably to you too Steve and I’m sure they’ll say, ‘Do I really need to be thinking about an ablation already at this point?” I mean, how do you handle that? What do you typically advise them to do?
Dr. Steve Ryan: Well the example you gave — in other words, if they’re taking flecainide as a pill-in-the-pocket they’re doing something, they’re trying to stop the afib, and they’re trying to stay in sinus with them. That’s good. I mean it may not be the best strategy but it may be something that will work for them for a while. But just the bad thing is to let people stay in afib and just give them a rate control beta blocker to keep their heart from beating too fast. That is what will kill somebody. But if they’re taking chemicals for drugs that will stop their afib, or if they have an attack will stop that attack, that’s good; it’s not the ideal but certainly they’re doing something to keep themselves out of afib, and that’s a good thing.
Travis Van Slooten: So the message here – and this is where I wanted to get to and I’m glad that we’re going there – is the message we’re sending here is — because I know it’s semantics, but if you were diagnosed with afib you have afib but then there are the actual episodes. To my mind they are two different things like I have afib but I’m not always in afib, I don’t always have episodes, at least for some people. So for the person that, okay, they’ve been diagnosed with afib but they’re not, they don’t have episodes all the time, in other words, they’re paroxysmal, the course of action may be fine to just stick with the drugs, but the key should be you’re taking those drugs, as you mention Steve, to get out of afib but not just stay in afib and make it tolerable.
Dr. Steve Ryan: Right, and of course we must say that anti-arrhythmic drugs are very imperfect, there’s no magic pill that anyone can take that will cure them of atrial fibrillation so they never have to worry about it again. The problem with today’s anti-arrhythmic drugs is that they don’t work or if they do work for a time they lose their effectiveness eventually, or they have bad side effects that they get impossible to take them. And they’ve done a number of studies where they have compared catheter ablation to taking anti-rhythmic drugs, and catheter ablation is much more healthy. It’s, you know, all the bad things that can come from staying like a lifetime on anti rhythmic drugs versus a catheter ablation where you’re cured of afib and you don’t have to worry about it anymore, there’s no comparison.
Travis Van Slooten: Yeah, absolutely. And then certainly for someone then that has persistent afib which means your episode is a week or longer or you have long-standing persistent afib, certainly those people should not accept the diagnosis that they should just live with their afib and here’s some drugs to make it more tolerable. Those are the people we especially are saying look, there is a cure or a potential cure out there for you and it’s probably going to be an ablation or a surgical procedure, but by all means you do not have to live with afib.
Dr. Steve Ryan: Right. Now in the example you gave we should tell patients that someone who has been in persistent afib for a while is not going to be as easy as someone who just developed afib. They may have to go to a master EP and they have to go through two ablations; one to get the main spot and second for a touch-up ablation, but it’s still a lot better than living with afib. And they should realize that if you have persistent afib you do not have to live in a fib. There is a cure out there. It may not be the easiest thing to do, or you may have to research and find the best EP doctor you can find, but there is light at the end of the afib tunnel. You don’t have to live for the rest of your life in afib.
Travis Van Slooten: And I think that’s such an important message because I get so many emails from people that are in persistent afib and they tell me you know my doctor says I’m not a candidate for an ablation because I’ve been in persistent afib for 2 years and they don’t want to touch me so they just keep me on drugs. Is that true? I mean that’s kind of the gist of a lot of the emails that I get, and I always tell them that’s absolutely not true. There is hope for you.
Dr. Steve Ryan: Yeah, and I can understand many of — first of all, not all electrophysiologists (EPs) are equal. Some are better than others, some are more experienced, some do not want to fool around with anyone who has been…in fact they will say in their statement on their websites, “We don’t take anyone who has been in persistent afib for over a year.” Why? Because it’s too difficult. But that’s not the case for some of the better people like you had your ablation by Dr. Natale, Andrea Natale, right?
Travis Van Slooten: Yes.
Dr. Steve Ryan: I mean people like him take those cases all the time.
Travis Van Slooten: Yeah, I mean 75% of his caseload is just that. But like you said, your path to a cure may not be necessarily easy but certainly do not give up and say, “Well this is my life and I just got to tolerate this for as long as I can with the drugs until my time is up.” That’s not the case. Good stuff.
Dr. Steve Ryan: I’ve got one other thing. At the last AF Symposium in January there was a presentation by a Dr. Marrouche that was perhaps the most important presentation in the last 10 or 20 years for patients. I mean it’s a groundbreaking study, and it relates to what we were talking about.
It’s called The Castle AF Clinical Trial. Now what they did was they took patients who had real bad heart problems, we’re talking ejection fraction of below 35%. These are people who probably without help would die within the next year. These are patients who had really sick hearts and they had ICDs or some kind of a monitoring device inside their heart that could tell the doctors whether they were in afib or not and what was going on in their heart. Dr. Marrouche started off by saying, he gave the example of a 50 year old patient of his who had an ejection fraction of 24%, I mean that’s really low. That guy is near death. So he had an ablation and he, by the way had moved from paroxysmal afib to persistent. He had taken anti-arrhythmic drugs that didn’t work; sotalol and Amiodarone, which Amiodarone is a killer.
Travis Van Slooten: Very toxic.
Dr. Steve Ryan: He had failed electrocardioversions. So he gave him an ablation and cured his afib and right away his ejection fraction improved from 24% to 44%.
Travis Van Slooten: Wow!
Dr. Steve Ryan: Now, what that means in practice is that this guy’s life was saved. He was no longer in danger of dying from congestive heart failure. And so he went on and described The Castle AF study with a bunch of patients like this and they found that after catheter ablation there was a 47% reduction in death rates. Now you’re saying, 47%, is that good? That’s fantastic! These patients were near death, and a 47% reduction in death rate for patients who had failing hearts, that’s incredible. In the catheter ablation group, 60% improved their ejection fraction by more than 35%. That is amazing.
Travis Van Slooten: That’s amazing.
Dr. Steve Ryan: That means that these patients who had a catheter ablation basically had their lives saved. They went from a heart that wasn’t functioning to a heart that was beating normally again. And after 5 years, 60% of the ablation group were in normal sinus rhythm compared to 22% receiving normal drug therapy. And that was you know, it could be rate control, it could be amiodarone, whatever people wanted to do. And there is a 38% reduction all across mortality. Heart failure emissions were radically improved. They didn’t go to the hospital anymore because they were cured, and obviously the quality of life was just amazingly better.
Now I want to read you something. I was at the conference and one of the interesting things about it was the question-and-answer afterwards. And I want to quote you something from Dr. Hugh Calkins at Johns Hopkins said, “This is such an unbelievably fantastic study. This is the first study to show that AF ablation improves mortality and heart failure; hats off to you for getting this done. All of us believed in this procedure but people kept asking us for hard endpoints, which you have provided.”
Here we have you and I both know how wonderful it feels to go from afib to sinus rhythm, but there were no studies up to this point that said it makes any difference. In other words, so what? So you’re in sinus rhythm, you still have the same mortality according to the AFFIRM study which is an old study that nobody follows anymore.
But now we have hard data that proves catheter ablation not only removes your symptoms, makes you afib free but lets you live longer. You live a better life and you live a longer life and the more healthy life. Now Dr. Douglas Parker from the Mayo Clinic added in the Q&A he said, I mean this is a little hyperbole, he’s exaggerating but he gets the point. “People everywhere were screaming with delight when they saw the results of your paper!” He’s right.
When you were there at that meeting it was like you were watching history unfold in a way. I mean historical finding that now everybody with afib knows that a catheter ablation will not only cure you and make you feel better but will let you live longer and more healthy life. That’s really important, probably the most important to study to come out for patients in the last 10 years.
Travis Van Slooten: Yeah, and that’s a published study so we can link to that and I can dig that up?
Dr. Steve Ryan: Yes, that’s a published study in January.
Travis Van Slooten: Perfect. And I think it’s important to, that study like you said these were people that were near death, so if they experienced that great transformation, imagine the guy that’s pretty much healthy and has paroxysmal afib, I mean the benefits for him are going to be… I mean, it’s amazing. Again, that’s why Steve and I are so passionate about this topic. There is no excuse to stay in afib.
Dr. Steve Ryan: Can you imagine, let’s say you’re someone with congestive heart failure; it feels like you’re suffocating, it feels like you’re going to die any minute. And 90% of people in this condition die within a year. And all of a sudden you have a catheter ablation and your heart is normal again, you’re having a normal ejection fraction. All of a sudden you’re out walking around, you’re talking to friends, you feel great. I mean you don’t feel perfect because it’s not…but your life you have your life back. Can you imagine what that means for these patients? It’s wonderful.
Travis Van Slooten: Yeah, and their families and friends. It’s just amazing. Thanks for sharing that study. Definitely I’ll be sure to link to that in the show notes so people can look at that. Awesome. Anything else that we need to discuss on this?
Dr. Steve Ryan: No.
Travis Van Slooten: So the message here Steve is clear. The goal for every afib patient should be to end their afib and not just manage it or tolerate it, correct?
Dr. Steve Ryan: Exactly. And we’re talking rate control where they just leave you in afib and don’t try to get you out of afib.
Travis Van Slooten: Yes, awesome. Well Steve it’s been a real pleasure talking to you and I just want to thank you for your time.
Dr. Steve Ryan: My pleasure.
Travis Van Slooten: And Steve you can be found at a-fib.com, correct?
Dr. Steve Ryan: Yes.
Travis Van Slooten: Awesome. And just a quick plug too, Steve’s got a great book, Beat Your Afib, available on his website and on Amazon as well. And Steve, are you going to be rolling out an updated version of that book, because I remember at one point you had mentioned you were going to work on an update. What’s the status of that?
Dr. Steve Ryan: Well, we’re working on the second edition but it hasn’t been coming along very well. We’ll keep trying. There’s just been a lot of changes in the last 4 years that needed to be addressed. The book right now is very factual and timely and helpful, but it’s just, there’s a lot of new developments like this Castle AF study. Those are the things that need to be added to the book.
Travis Van Slooten: Yeah, and the beauty of the book is as the title implies, “Beat Your Afib,” not live with your Afib so that’s why I wanted to put a plug in there for that book. Steve again, thanks for your time and we’ll talk to you soon. Thanks Steve.
Dr. Steve Ryan: You’re welcome.
Resources and Websites Mentioned:
Atrial Fibrillation Fact Sheet from the CDC
Editorial: Leaving the Patient in A-Fib—No! No! No!
2018 AF Symposium: Findings from the CASTLE-AF Clinical Trial
Catheter Ablation for Atrial Fibrillation with Heart Failure (CASTLE-AF Clinical Trial)
Travis,
Happy Father’s Day!
I am now 44, was first diagnosed with afib in March of 2013 at 38 years old. I went almost 4 years before my second episode. Then in February of 2017 I had two of them about three weeks apart. Now one year later I have been getting frequent episodes.
Started back up in March and I have had several episodes since then (total of about 10). They are sometimes spaced out by 1,2,3 weeks and there have been a couple only separated by days seems to be pretty random though. This problem has recently been consuming my life. I am under a bit of stress, but my episodes seem to occur as I am falling asleep. I feel great all day, no problems, but then as I relax at night sometimes I am trying to fight off an episode needless to say it affects my sleep and my mood/life the following day.
I have a follow up in September to discuss ablation, but after reading this article I am just wondering if I should be concerned and get it done sooner. My episodes last about 6 hours each time, I can almost set my watch by them. I have had all tests and everything is structurally fine.
I am taking an aspirin a day and the occasional Diltiazem, but I feel that my episodes occur when my heart rate slows so I don’t like to take the Diltiazem unless I actually have an episode. Just looking for some advice as to the ablation. I am definitely going to have it done just not sure if I wanted to wait a bit.
Thanks,
Joe
Joe:
Thanks for the Father’s Day wishes! It’s hard to believe but it was 12 years ago today that I was first diagnosed with afib. I spent Father’s Day in 2006 in an emergency room and had my first cardioversion. Good times:)
Your situation is similar to mine. I went 8 years with only an episode occurring every year or two. Then in the 8th year they started occurring more and more – every other week or so. And like you, my episodes never lasted more than 6 hours but I was popping flecainide at the time as well whenever I’d have an episode. As soon as my episodes got worse, I had the ablation and I haven’t looked back since.
I would STRONGLY advise you to consider having an ablation. I don’t mean to be a pessimist but the odds of your afib getting better (with or without drugs) are very slim. Your afib will likely only get worse. It’s better to nip this in the bud NOW vs. having to deal with it down the road.
If you go the ablation route, however, make absolutely sure you go to an elite-level EP. If you haven’t listened to this episode yet, please do so:
How Can I Increase My Odds of Having a Successful Afib Ablation?
I don’t know where you live but if you contact me directly via this blog (see my contact page) I can give you some recommendations of elite-level EPs.
I wish you the best!
Travis
At 54 I was diagnosed with AFIB 4 years ago. Initially, it was occurring every other month. I was prescribed metoprolol and diltiazem but they were ineffective. Over time, my symptoms worsened. My Dr. then prescribed another drug Multaq (a dangerous drug) which was not effective and also caused my symptoms to worsen.
I did a little searching to find a better treatment for my condition. Fortunately I came across your website and took your advice on ablation. I found a reputable EP and researcher. February 2017 I had the procedure. Since then I only had one episode which occurred a week after the procedure (common). Life has been good. I work out, go on my power walks and cycle. I am free of heart meds and enjoying life!
David:
That’s so awesome to hear! Thanks for sharing your story. I’m sure it will provide inspiration for many many people. Thanks! I wish you many years of NSR!
Travis
One stat that seems to hold true is, the younger someone is ablated the more success they enjoy. The other stat that should concern anyone with our condition is staying in Afib begets more afib that worsens with age and can shorten our lives. Of course that can vary to some degree depending on each circumstance from patient to patient, yours truly abif has gotten better with age from homepathic treatment. I will take my chances on ablation until I absolutely find it necessary. When we reach that point is a very personal decision only we can answer.
James,
What protocol do you use? Are you on any prescribed drugs, if you don’t mind me asking? My AFIB started increasing in episodes in t he last several months. My doctor put me on a drug that I am having side effects.
I am hoping magnesium and diet will help.
Thanks,
Terri
Terri, For my adrenals, I take several supplements and vitamins to control my cortisol levels.
Travis, Does this mean you may have to change the title of this site to “Not living with afib”? Heh
Yes, I should change the name of my site…lol! Unfortunately, “beat your afib” and “stop your afib” were already taken back when I started this site. And when I started this site I was literally “living with afib.” I hadn’t beat it yet so it worked.
Travis
Travis, as we have discussed on several occasions, leaving someone in Afib is not a good option. I have never bought into the pill for every ill theory, so it’s easy to refuse standing meds.
I am still royally pissed off at my first cardio who left me in afib for 10 days with my 2nd episode. I finally demanded the TEE and woke up to NSR because there was no clotting pre-cardioversion. I am now against taking supplements to convert due to the fact that it leaves most in afib for too long, up to 15 hours last time for me. I have always chemically converted in 50-120 minutes. And I think there is little negative impact to our hearts for the short amount of time. The day that doesn’t happen, I will be booking a trip to Austin.
I agree with you 100% that leaving someone in afib is NOT a good option. As Steve and I discussed, the goal should be to get out of afib as soon as you can. I don’t understand why any doctor would be o.k. leaving their patients in long-standing persistent or permanent afib if they don’t have to.
Travis
Great information, guys. It seems you are describing me in the article as I am in persistent afib (for abut 18 months) and on a heart rate cocktail, primarily Tikosyn and Metroprolol.
Per the advice from you two, we are researching a “maestro” EP for an ablation.
You are promoting the Texas clinic, but what other facilities/EP’s in the country can you recommend? And what would be the most important question to a potential EP to determine his/her “maestro” level?
Thanks.
Travis, another jam-packed podcast. You and Steve are really telling like it is! One more thought about just ‘living’ with your A-Fib. The Pharmaceutical Industry.
Did you know drug companies spend more on marketing their drugs than developing new or better drugs?
They don’t want you cured of your A-Fib. They want you taking their drugs for a LIFETIME.
This is especially true for their heavily advertised blood thinners (anticoagulants) targeted at patients with Atrial Fibrillation.
Their ads don’t tell you these drugs do NOTHING to treat your Atrial Fibrillation! They only address your increased risk of clots and stroke. (While important, it’s only part of your treatment plan.)
Don’t fall prey to their hype. “Don’t just take your meds and get used to your A-Fib.” (Actual quote to patient by her doctor.) Seek your Cure—a Life without A-Fib.
Very good article. Travis is a great ambassador for people with a-fib. Even after his ablation he keeps on helping people with atrial fibrillation. He helps all of us with his research. I would just like to thank him personally.
I’m back in sinus rhythm now but they are keeping me on beta blockers and blood thinners. Will this medication harm me over time?
Many Thanks,
Patrick
Thanks for your kind words, Patrick. I appreciate it.
Regarding your question, I’m going to refer you to a great article Steve Ryan wrote about blood thinners and their potential side effects:
http://a-fib.com/faqs-a-fib-drug-therapy-anticoagulant-side-effects-xarelto-alternatives/
With beta blockers, the potential common side effects are fatigue (and sometimes extreme fatigue – zombie like fatigue), impotence, and depression.
Travis
Cheers Travis great reading. I am now awaiting for a 24 hr monitor and to see my consultant again. He may take me off the medication when I go back but I don’t think so. I had a cardioversion last May and was doing well until March of this year when I jumped back into a-fib for few weeks due to a chest infection. I reverted back to sinus rhythm. I’m now on the medication again. It is a pain. I drive a bus for a living and I was banned for 12 weeks to get it under control. Thanks again for your help. -Patrick
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