I Hate A-Fib

Tomorrow I undergo a procedure called catheter ablation to correct a condition I have called atrial fibrillation. I’ve had it for over two years now and it is potentially life-threatening. Here is a brief overview; I have absolutely no medical training so forgive any mistakes.

Your heart is a muscle divided into four chambers. The two on top are called the left and right atria; the bottom are the left and right ventricles. Blood circulates through the four chambers in the process of obtaining oxygen from the lungs, spreading it throughout the body, and returning to remove carbon dioxide.

Atrial fibrillation means that the two upper chambers beat erratically. No longer are they in sync with the lub-dub, lub-dub normal heartbeat. It’s a rather squishy, sped-up type of beating. This can happen for a certain amount of time every now and then (that’s what happens to me), or it can happen all the time. The danger is that due to this off-beat pattern blood can pool in the ventricles and potentially form a clot. When heart beat returns to normal, the clot can travel to the brain and result in a stroke.

The first thing the doctors did was put me on medication. Four types of drugs. Coumadin is a blood thinner; this lessens the chance of a clot forming in my heart. The other three are designed to regulate my heartbeat. They do, with varying success. One of the drugs I’m on is called Toprol. A side effect of Toprol is depression, and I do feel the negative effect of this drug, so much so that I asked my doctor to lower my dosage. He did. So, another motivation to correct atrial fibrillation is to get off the drug cocktail.

The aim of ablation therapy is to kill the muscle fibers in the atria that are twitching erratically. This is done by inserting wires in through my groin, up my arteries and into the heart. My heart is stimulated into fibrillation; the offending fibers are burned; over the next days and weeks scar tissue forms and new fibers transmit the electrical signals that produce the lub-dub, lub-dub beating.

Before the procedure I am mildly sedated and a tube is sent down my esophagus to search for any present clotting. If none is found, I go in to the OR. I’m pumped full of general anesthesia, and over the next four or five hours the ablation procedure is done. If all goes well, I have an overnight stay in the hospital just for observation and go home the next day. The worst part is the two incisions at my groin. Overnight my legs are immobilized so I don’t accidentally re-open the bandaged wounds. My chest is also tight, especially when I breath deeply, due to the burning in the heart.

This is the second time I’m having this done; the first time was in November. Statistically, there’s a 70 percent chance of fixing the fibrillation after one procedure; after two attempts, there’s an 85 percent chance. After my November surgery, the a-fib events became much, much less in frequency and duration, but they still happened, about every other day or so for about five minutes each occurrence. Too much for me to feel comfortable going off the medication. If this time doesn’t fix it, however, that drug cocktail may be in my future for the rest of my life.

If there’s anyone out there reading this, please keep my in your prayers. As I always tell anyone whenever the subject comes up, I need all the prayers I can get.