cardiactec

her sonotech, yes that is true. i am actually an echo tech myself and a lot of cardio's who know enough about MVP know that both hydration and patient position have everything to do with provoking the mitral valve to prolapse.....and it's not that it would be a false positive...what it would be would be a false negative NOT to diagnose what is present since IT TRULY IS THERE! -- whether or not it only appears prolapsed JUST when you are leaning forward or being upright instead of just when supine. some docs however debate the finding of MVP if a patient is found to have it and they are dehydrated, because dehydration is a physiologic state that can be reversed with fluids. position obviously cannot be "reversed" because who the heck is going to stay supine the rest of their life! haha. i have had four or five echos and three have shown it to be prolapsing and two have shown it not to be prolapsing. i think a lot of it has to do with autonoic innervation to the heart on the day of the actual echo imaging......since we all know that pots fluctuates in symptoms from day to day with a wax and wane pheonomenon, it makes sense..... i was at mayo a couple months ago and saw a cardio there and was asking her why sometimes the MVP is there and other times it is not and she said that hydration, body position during testing, and autonomic function that day all play a role but that the primary diagnotic tool for MVP is to have a patient bear down (do a valsalva) while a cardio listens with a stethescope in different position (patient body position) and then have the patient release from the valsalva and if they can hear a true click, then MVP is present. if they can, than it's not.... what are your symptoms and how many echo have you had? get a good doc if you dont have one. some cardios are wierd and are reluctant to even tell the patient they have MVP unless it is accompanied by regurgitation (cuz then the patient and doc must acknowledge the possibility of endocarditis and the patient must be prophylactic).......

hey bee, yeah i think it is odd that i dont really feel like passing out with rates that high....but hey i'm not complaining....sometimes i wish they would do an EP study on me just to look at the conduction pathways....some days i really feel like i just have inappropriate sinus tachy and not POTS because i'm not dizzy and presyncopal like the rest of the gang with pots (at least i hear the clinical features for pots are mainly dizziness and pre-syncopal episodes).....i do get symptomatic sometimes......but just the other day (and this is on beta) i was just sitting outside in the heat and even sitting my rates were 150 and i had no clue. i thought my rates were normal cuz i couldnt feel anything.......some days though i get very nauseous but very rarely do i experience pre-syncopal feelings and i have never passed out.....i dont know, some day i think they are right with the diagnosis of POTS and other days i just think it's inappropriate sinus tach.....the tilt test definitely showed a postural contribution though to the heart rate and that's why they all jumped on the banwagon of POTS ......rates lying down to standing go from like 70 to 200 in like 15 seconds and usually i dont feel a thing.... bee, i too have had a cath.....had it when i was 19.......along with a TEE, regular transthoracic echo's, tilt, the whole cardiac workup aside from an EP study (minus the tilt test)..... how come they cathed you? or were you just referring to the EP cath you had? they thought you had long QT syndrome? did they rule that out with the EP study? how come you now have tachy (even if it is just sinus) and do the docs relate that to a sudden onset of POTS or from playing around in your conduction pathways during your EP study? how long after your EP study/ablation did you start up with the sinus tach? sorry so many questions!! )

it resolved? did the doc tell you that? i didnt think it could resolve.....i have heard it resolving with beta blocker therapy.....

hey carolyn, does your toprol help with the rates? how much do you take daily?

just curious, how many of you POTS people have MVP as well? i think dr.low from mayo is starting to investigate some sort of corelation btwn the two.....at least in his questionarrie and in a lot of these questionairres for POTS research there seemingly is always the question "do you have MVP"...

yeah i was just basically curious as to who in this forum has rates as high as 200 (being sinus in origin) for POTS heart rates while standing cuz i went to beth israel research in boston and the neuro there was FLOORED that my rates while upright were 200 and that overall, i didnt have a problem with standing still for 13 minutes other than feeling a little sweaty and SOB. he said that all the pots patients he has seen have never had sinus tach at 200 and he was floored that i did so well with being upright with rates that high because he has patients come in with rates of 120 that only can stand for 5 minutes because they are so symptomatic......

wow, bee and maggs, so you both were the diagnosed with conduction property abnormalities and then later (after ablation/cardioversion) were also diagnosed with POTS? i have rates at 200 but it is all sinus in origin, no PSVT or reentry like you guys.....the true definition of SVT is a heart rate over 150, basically coming from above the ventricles (hence the supra), so were you true SVT, meaning you had a wacky part of your heart other than the sinus node firing off a million shots a sec? or was it sinus tachy at 240? most people think that if it it over 150 than it is SVT, which in fact it is, but an SVT can be sinus, atrial tach, atrial flutter/fib, etc............so i was just curious as to whether or not your SVT was sinus or another focal point in the heart firing like crazy. i assume since they cardioverted you that it wasnt sinus tach........unless you had docs that couldnt read ekg! )

hi there, i'm new to the site.... just wondering if any of you are on sotalol. it's a pretty potent beta blocker....but it seems to be helping a lot for me. also, just curious as to what all of your heart rates were/are while upright (before going on meds).......my rates were crazy, and i think the highest that i saw posted somewhere on this site was like 180.....and i wasnt sure if that was sinus tachy or a true conduction problem in the heart (like PSVT, or PAT).....

hey there jacquie, sorry to hear that you feel like passing out. how is your breathing? if you are taking shallow breaths, even if you are not consciously aware of it, that can make you feel like passing out even if your bp is good....i know with pots, breathing troubles occur (i deal with that weekly)......if you arent moving air in and out of your lungs with good breath, blood has a hard time becoming oxygen rich and instead builds up carbon dioxide, which can make you feel light-headed, which can make you feel like passing out...........try to get some good breath's in, deep breath's. it sometimes helps for me...

hey all, i am new on the site. just wanted to respond to the breathing discussion. wondering if any of you feel like your diaphragm wont prevent you from taking "normal" breaths, like breaths that should be involuntary instead of always feeling like it is a voluntary effort to make your diaphragm help to move air....??