1980: When I was ten I had practiced judo and earned my yellow belt, but I grew bored with it, so I quit. Then in college I joined the intramural judo club. Because of my earlier training, I was quite good at break-falls, and I enjoyed practicing them. Because I was also the lightest man in the club and quite capable of protecting myself in a fall, everyone enjoyed practicing throwing me. Unfortunately, the workouts were fairly intense, and I had not learned how to eat well ahead of time. So I was running high on adrenaline. This irritated my heart, and soon break-falls, even perfect ones, would cause me tachycardia.

The instructors sent me to the student health clinic. From there I went to the university Medical Center’s cardiology clinic, where I was diagnosed with WPW. I discussed treatment options with the cardiologist. We agreed that staying completely off caffeine and not taking any drugs would be a viable choice for me. The cardiologist taught me the valsalva, a maneuver that raises my blood pressure and can be used to try to control tachycardia. I was not restricted in any way from participating in sports. Nevertheless, tachycardia interfered with my Judo practice to the point that I quit.

1988: I went to a party at a park. As was my habit, I neglected breakfast and fluids, and as a result, playing volleyball made me release a lot of adrenaline into my bloodstream. I got thirsty, but the water fountain didn’t work. The only drink available was Dr. Pepper. I weighed the risks of dehydration and tachycardia, and downed one. That and volleyball led to tachycardia ... so I lay down on the grass to try to control it. It would not go away.

A friend came over and asked me how I was doing. I said to him that if it’s not better in five minutes, he should go get Rob. Rob, a friend of ours at the party, was a paramedic. My friend said “It’s been five minutes. I’m getting Rob.”

Rob showed up and I told him what was going on. He pulled out his walkie-talkie and called for an ambulance. He had me do a valsalva, but it made me lose consciousness for a second or two. He told me that the ambulance was on its way and to hang in there. I was hyperventilating and developing carpal contractions ... because of the reduced blood flow to my extremities, my wrists and fingers contracted. I must have looked pretty scary. I was agitated and nervous, but I don’t recall actually being afraid. I was more annoyed than anything else.

Then my heart stopped.

I said, “Rob, I’m stopped.”

He seemed a bit surprised, but he checked my pulse ... and found none. He did a single good CPR thump on my chest and my heart started right back up, but still in tachycardia. I was aware the whole time—I didn’t lose consciousness at all.

Having your heart stop is a scary feeling, and surprising in a bad way. Imagine having hiked all day long, and gotten so used to the constant thump thump thump on the bottoms of your feet that you can’t feel it any more. Then your next step takes you over a cliff, and the thump thump stops. Even though you’d become unaware of it, now that it’s gone, you miss it.

It was a most welcome sensation when my heart started again, even though it was still in tachycardia.

Finally, in the distance, I could hear the siren of the arriving ambulance. The paramedics laid out their gear around me and attached EKG electrodes to my chest.

“How are we doing?” one paramedic asked.

“Not too well. I’m having tachycardia and I can’t control it.”

“Okay, we’ll take care of you.”

They asked me to try a valsalva, but I explained that it makes me pass out. They insisted, so I tried again, and passed out. Of course, as soon as I passed out, I released the pressure and came to again. I got so caught up in my tachycardia and breathing that I was not aware that they set up an IV line to dump saline solution into me. The paramedics tried to get me to control my breathing because my hyperventilation was screwing up my body chemistry something awful.

Eventually get got me loaded into the ambulance and drove me to a hospital. They tried all kinds of things to get my tachycardia to convert to a normal rhythm. More valsalva maneuvers, vagus massage, elevating my feet, more IV fluids ... nothing worked. My heart rate was 220 beats per minute. Finally, as they were deciding whether to give me some serious vasoconstrictor drugs, my heart converted to a normal sinus rhythm. But I was not out of the woods yet, for my heart rate jumped to 240 BPM That’s four beats per second. I was in serious danger of a heart attack.

I was wheeled out of the ambulance and into the ER, where I was hooked up to another EKG. It beeped at a furious rate. There were people everywhere, getting ready to do all sorts of things. They told me that now I should just lie quietly wait as my heart rate slowed down to normal. Suddenly my room was empty, and I only had my EKG for company. That was when the enormity of what had happened descended upon me. I realized that I had come very close to dying. I began to cry, and as I reached for the nurse call button my EKG skipped a few beeps.

Damn, I thought. All I need now is to knock an electrode loose and have the staff think I’d had cardiac arrest again. The place would be swarming with people again, and they’d do things to me that would hurt. I managed to reach the call button and talk to the nurse. I needed to talk to somebody.

One by one they let my friends come and visit me. The first ones were kind of scared ... everybody thought I was dying. As the news got back to the waiting room that I was going to be okay, my visitors got more cheerful.

Throughout my stay in the ER I listened intently to my EKG. Its steadily slowing beeping reassured me that my heart was still beating and that it was slowing down to a reasonable rate. Having experienced cardiac arrest, that steady beeping was very reassuring and comforting.

After two or three hours I was suddenly the focus of attention as nurses came in and started doing things. Nobody told me what was going on, and my EKG stopped beeping.

“Hey!” I shouted. My heart had stopped again!

“Oh. We turned it off.”

“You could warn a guy! ”

“Oh, sorry about that.”

Then they all left, except for the cardiologist. He told me that I could get up now. I told him that I would, but I’d get up slowly to prevent a head rush He looked at me with a look that said, “What a good idea.” I sat up, slowly ... and felt a large uncomfortable pressure in my belly. My eyes must have bugged out, for the doctor looked concerned.

“I have to go pee! Now! ... But how can that be? I only had one can of pop.”

“Well, the paramedics put two units of saline solution into your arm. Do you want to walk to the bathroom now?”

So that’s what I did, slowly. I had an amazing pee, one for the record books.

I found out later that Rob gave the paramedics a full report, including the part about my cardiac arrest and his CPR. The paramedics were amazed and incensed that anyone should administer CPR to a patient not connected to an EKG. They made a formal complaint to the cardiologist. His response was simple: The patient complained of cardiac arrest. The paramedic on the scene administered CPR and restarted the patient’s heart. We have a live patient. Therefore it was proper procedure.

Later that night, I had trouble sleeping. I kept waking up to check my pulse—was my heart still beating? I got tired of that, for I needed a good uninterrupted night of sleep. I had a conversation with myself. I said, look: If my heart should stop while I sleep, I’ll die. As long as I can worry about whether my heart is still beating, I’m alive. So stop worrying and let me sleep! I slept soundly the rest of the night.

The hospital referred my to my physician for follow-up care, so I saw him a few days later. He immediately set an appointment with a cardiologist so that I could run a stress test. They hooked me up to an EKG and blood pressure monitor, then had me run on a treadmill that kept getting steeper and faster. Running felt very good: it was wonderful how my legs were telling me, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, this is good!” and my heart and lungs were agreeing.

Eventually the cardiologist and nurse began to look a bit worried, and told me that I was on control of the test and could quit any time I wanted to. I felt that it was a challenge, so I decided to keep on going. It was quite steep and fast by now, and I was working quite hard. You are in control, they reminded me. You can quit any time. So I decided to quit at the end of the current stage. They breathed a sigh of relief.

The cardiologist looked over the stack of paper my run had generated, then evaluated my performance. He told me that my results were excellent ... for someone my age and weight, I tested out at 110% of average heart-lung capacity. We discussed my treatment options, and again agreed that drugs weren’t a good match for me, and this time I’d stay off caffeine for good.

I walked away from that appointment feeling as though I was three feet up in the air. I wasn’t going to die at any moment, and I could go running and playing if I felt like it. A few days later I was out with friends, and we had to stop somewhere to get money out of a bank teller machine. I got out of the car, ran across the street, got my money, and ran back to the car.

“We’re not in a hurry, Mike. Why did you run?” “Because I can.”

Over the next ten years I stayed strictly away form caffeine. I had tachycardia now and again, but nothing that lasted more than a few seconds.

1995: I took up hockey, and occasionally during games I’d get tachycardia.

1997: At hockey a teammate who was also a cardiologist told me about the catheter ablation treatment.

1998: At a hockey tournament and often during games I had tachycardia. I felt betrayed by my body, and as though I let down my teammates. It was time to get the treatment. I called up Kaiser to ask for a referral to a cardiologist, but they told me that only my general practitioner could do that. So I played their red-tape game: I saw my doctor and asked him to refer me to a specialist in cardiology. The cardiologist referred me to a sub-specialist in electrophysiology. I told this doctor the whole story of my heart condition. He talked about the procedure. I asked him to compare it to other common surgery.

“It’s easier than having your wisdom teeth out.”

I’m familiar with my heart condition—I’ve lived with it for twenty years—and I’ve read up on the treatment. This would, according to everything I’ve read, solve the problem for good, and without lifelong dependency on drugs or their side effects. It has some risks and is somewhat uncomfortable, but I know I’m physically up to the challenge. (I’m a rough and tough hockey goalie!) I discussed the treatment with my cardiologist, and the prospect of a life without tachycardia or drugs to control it is well worth the risks. But still, I was anxious. My cardiologist prescribed Valium for me, but since I’ve never taken the drug and everyone tells me how addictive it is, I was anxious about taking it. A friend of mine, who is a professional drug & alcohol rehabilitation counselor, told me that taking Valium for such nervousness is okay. If you need the drugs, he said, take them. That reassured me.

Next: Preparing for Surgery

Catheter Ablation for Tachycardia: My Experience as a Patient. Revised: 11/09/2001
URL: http://www.timberwoof.com/surgery/index.shtml
Copyright ©1998, 1999, 2001 by Michael Roeder. All Rights Reserved. Unauthorized use or distribution of any text, photos, or artwork from this website, without the express written permission of the owner, is in violation of U.S. and international copyright laws.
The author is a software engineer, not a physician. This web site is not intended to give any medical advice, render any diagnosis, or recommend any course of treatment. This web site has not been reviewed by any doctor. Your experience may differ from the author’s. If you have any heart symptoms, see your doctor.