2-Oct-2009

During a recent visit to the cardiologist, I asked him what the main triggers were for Arterial Fibrillation. He said, based on his 25 years of experience in the field, alcohol and stress were by far the most common triggers. Thinking back to my own bouts with AFib, I can relate at least two to these factors.

Alcohol: I'm not much of a drinker and in recent years. a glass of wine with dinner was the only alcohol I consumed. One night however, for reasons long forgotten, I drank well over half a bottle. That night I went into AFib.

Stress: The last time I went into AFib I was sitting with my wife in the living room watching a movie on DVD. I remember there was one particular scene that really got the adrenaline pumping... one of those cliffhangers with imminent peril awaiting the main character in the story. I can't remember the name now, but it was one of those movies that you can become totally immersed in. Sure enough, at the peak of the action I slipped into AFib.

I can just hear it now as you read this... "Stress?! You call that stress! I'll tell you what stress is....". Yes, I know how silly that must sound, but I'm simply telling you what happened. The cardiologist told me once that the more often you go into AFib, the more likely you'll go into it again. I've lost count, but I guess I've been in AFib four of five times now; i.e. I was primed for another attack. Apparently this movie just pushed me over the edge. In another update I'll tell you about some of the tricks I've learned to help prevent this from happening again, including information on how I determine if I'm really in AFib or not, and things that I do to return myself to sinus rhythm without outside intervention.

1-Oct-2009

Some time ago I started an EKGwatch account on Twitter. My hope was that visitors to this website would also post their related experiences more or less real-time as 'Tweets'. Twitter? Tweets? If some of your are a bit long in the tooth like me, you may not be up on the latest social networking websites, but if I can do it, I'm sure anyone can. I especially like Twitter because its simple, fast, and concise. It's much like writing a 'Post-it' note that everyone can see. For example, you're at your doctor's office and you've been waiting for an hour for a 5 minute doctor's visit. You can grab your cell phone and send a tweet to your fellow EKGwatch followers telling them how much fun you are having (or not). You finally see the doc after waiting what seems hours (and in many cases it really is) and he tells you to loose weight and get more exercise and make another appointment on your way out. Tweet about that and see how that compares to what your fellow cardiac patients are being told. If you don't have a cell phone with this capability, you can always jot down your thoughts on a piece of paper and post them on Twitter when you get home using your computer. Well, you get the idea. If you don't have a Twitter account, it takes just seconds to set one up. EKGwatch is a protected account which means it is by invitation only. I did this to keep the spammers from pitching their wares on the on the account. Well, enough said. If you're interested, click on the Twitter button at the bottom left of the page. There you can start an account if you don't already have one and post a request to join the EKGwatch Twitter group. Costs nothing, and hopefully will be a lot of fun. Hope to see you there...