nymima sorry to hear about your mother. Its got to be tough to stand by and watch and not be able to help. As you said a-fib is progressive. Drugs are a palliative answer and an ablation may or may not work nothing is set in cement when it comes to a-fib and it varies greatly from individual to individual. From what I understand rhythm medication tend to wear off with time and stop working or dont work as well as they once did. There are some other medications but each comes with their own set of who is best suited to use this and why depending on ones personal medical history. This is something you, your mother and her cardiologist will have to look at. It might be that an EP could help further with other options (they are the specialists for rhythm). They deal with a-fib regularly and know what we go through. Some, but not all, are gung-ho about ablations (which your mother understandably doesnt want ) but you wont know unless you talk to them.

You said that she has had a-fib for 20-some years then I assume (or at least hope) that she has learned to live with it. If not there are some people on this forum who also have breathing techniques or yoga that they do to help calm themselves to keep the anxiety to a minimum level. Maybe theyll chime in and help on that front.

I hope you find an answer best wishes to both you and your mother,
atp (across the pond)

Across the Pond - I thank you for your input. My mother does square breathing when she has an episode. It does help her to remain calm. She gets severe flank pain after the episodes, which we are thinking pertains to kidney cysts. So she had an ultra-sound recently of her kidneys and bladder - ordered by her geriatric care physician. We will find out shortly. I don't know of any other reason why she would have this bad back pain and groin pain after the a-fib episode. Her kidney numbers are not good. Yet she hangs in there. I suppose you could say she has learned to live with it. But it was always intermittent. I would say now, that it has become chronic. (several times a week). TY

I had a neighbor who was in persistent afib. She had it all the time...she was 103 and I think she had had afib for 9 years. I know she took Warfarin but I don't know what else. She didn't seem concerned about it.

I might guess, your Mom's Dr. might change her meds to see if another one would be more effective to keep here episodes at a minimum. Or she might go into persistent and have it all the time and have the symptoms controlled. Or she might just stay as is for awhile.

Is she symptomatic? How long do here episodes last? Does she self convert?

Yogacat: 103? OMG, persistent afib at 103! She better rush out and get an ablation. The afib could remodel her heart 20 years down the road! :-) petey

LOL Petey....yes 103!