Atrial Fibrillation (AFib) Support Group
Atrial fibrillation (AF or afib) is an abnormal heart rhythm (cardiac arrhythmia) which involves the two small, upper heart chambers (the atria). Heart beats in a normal heart begin after electricity generated in the atria by the sinoatrial node spread through the heart and cause contraction of the heart muscle and pumping of blood.
This post may be rather lengthy, but hopefully it will give folks who have questions about ablations some much needed answers, from the perspective of the patient.
My cryo ablation was performed February 4, 2015, by Dr. David DeLurgio at Emory St. Joseph's Hospital in Atlanta. Dr. DeLurgio is the head of Electrophysiology at Emory, and I couldn't have picked a better doctor.
First I should probably give a little background about myself. I'm a 38 year-old male, and had suffered with Afib and SVT for over 20 years before the procedure. I was still paroxysmal at the time of surgery, and even though my Afib episodes would self-terminate, they still happened daily, and made my life a living hell. Some people are asymptomatic, meaning they don't even realize when they're in Afib. I'm the opposite end of the scale. I was painfully aware of every heartbeat, and if I was in Afib, I knew it. It was impossible to concentrate on anything else.
When I was first diagnosed, it felt like a death sentence. But the more I read about Afib (and I read everything I could get my hands on), the more I realized that this condition can be treated, and in some cases even cured. It certainly is not a death sentence.
I did my research on the best electrophysiologists in the area, and decided on Dr. DeLurgio after a consult with him in January of 2015.
Needless to say, the day of my surgery I was nervous. I had never been under general anesthesia before, and that was what I was most nervous about. The staff at Emory was world-class, and a consult with the anesthesiologist quickly put my fears to bed. Choosing a big-city hospital with a good reputation and a proven track record of performing this kind of surgery (as well as my surgeon's experience) made all the difference in my outcome.
For any of you thinking about an ablation and maybe you live in a rural area, consider traveling to a bigger city to have your ablation done. Larger hospitals do more of these procedures, and with more experience comes better results. Shop around, do your homework! This is your heart, it's worth the extra research.
I remember being wheeled into the EP lab where the surgery would take place, and technicians placing various electrodes on my chest and back to measure electrical activity. The next thing I remember, I woke up in the recovery room. My chest muscles felt a little tight, and my throat was sore from the breathing tube used during the surgery, but that had all been explained to me beforehand, so I was expecting it. It was mildly uncomfortable, but not at all painful.
I had an MRI done the previous day (to check for any structural abnormalities that my last echocardiogram might have missed). Two catheters were used in my surgery, one on each side of my groin. One was a mapping catheter, which took "pictures" of the inside of my heart. This info was somehow combined with the data from the previous day's MRI to give my doctors a super-accurate picture of my heart - the technology is absolutely amazing. The other catheter was the "business end" which did the actual ablating. In my case, a Medtronic Arctic Front cryo balloon was used.
My surgery was a phenomenal success. After the procedure, while I was still in recovery, Dr. DeLurgio shared some scans of my heart with my wife and family. These images show the electrical activity of the heart represented by color:
http://s28.postimg.org/jz01x31dp/heart.jpg
The left side is pre-ablation. You can see that my heart looks like a thunderstorm, and that's certainly how it felt. The right side is post-ablation, and shows 100% normal electrical activity. It's like my doctor hit the reset switch on my heart, and it's now operating like it should, after decades of herky-jerky rhythm.
The big question now is, how do I feel? In a word - cured. They told me that some Afib would be normal while the scar tissue forms, but as of today, 3 days post-ablation, I haven't had any Afib at all. A few blips of SVT, but nothing like what I experienced before. I'm hoping that this is a trend that will continue.
Immediately following the surgery, my heart rate was higher than I was used to (96-100 resting, 115 when I was up and walking), but that quickly settled down to the mid 80s, and by the following morning, my heart had settled down to a comfortable 75bpm, and I was released from the hospital. Today my pulse is in the low 70s. I was able to half the dose of beta blockers I was taking, and was also able to discontinue the medicine I was taking for high blood pressure.
I'm following my doctor's advice and taking it easy for the first week post-ablation - resting a lot, not lifting anything heavy. My groin is a little sore from the catheter on the right side, but the tightness in my chest is gone, and best of all, NO AFIB! Words cannot express how happy I am. My experience with ablation is a textbook example of everything going perfectly, with the best possible outcome. Of course, your mileage may vary. But like I said before, choosing the right doctor and hospital made all the difference. If your doctor says you're a good candidate for ablation but you're on the fence because, well, it's heart surgery - don't be. Knee surgery would be harder on you (and probably riskier as well) than a cryo ablation. If I continue to feel as good as I do today, I'll be singing the praises of the cryo ablation for the rest of my days.
My cryo ablation was performed February 4, 2015, by Dr. David DeLurgio at Emory St. Joseph's Hospital in Atlanta. Dr. DeLurgio is the head of Electrophysiology at Emory, and I couldn't have picked a better doctor.
First I should probably give a little background about myself. I'm a 38 year-old male, and had suffered with Afib and SVT for over 20 years before the procedure. I was still paroxysmal at the time of surgery, and even though my Afib episodes would self-terminate, they still happened daily, and made my life a living hell. Some people are asymptomatic, meaning they don't even realize when they're in Afib. I'm the opposite end of the scale. I was painfully aware of every heartbeat, and if I was in Afib, I knew it. It was impossible to concentrate on anything else.
When I was first diagnosed, it felt like a death sentence. But the more I read about Afib (and I read everything I could get my hands on), the more I realized that this condition can be treated, and in some cases even cured. It certainly is not a death sentence.
I did my research on the best electrophysiologists in the area, and decided on Dr. DeLurgio after a consult with him in January of 2015.
Needless to say, the day of my surgery I was nervous. I had never been under general anesthesia before, and that was what I was most nervous about. The staff at Emory was world-class, and a consult with the anesthesiologist quickly put my fears to bed. Choosing a big-city hospital with a good reputation and a proven track record of performing this kind of surgery (as well as my surgeon's experience) made all the difference in my outcome.
For any of you thinking about an ablation and maybe you live in a rural area, consider traveling to a bigger city to have your ablation done. Larger hospitals do more of these procedures, and with more experience comes better results. Shop around, do your homework! This is your heart, it's worth the extra research.
I remember being wheeled into the EP lab where the surgery would take place, and technicians placing various electrodes on my chest and back to measure electrical activity. The next thing I remember, I woke up in the recovery room. My chest muscles felt a little tight, and my throat was sore from the breathing tube used during the surgery, but that had all been explained to me beforehand, so I was expecting it. It was mildly uncomfortable, but not at all painful.
I had an MRI done the previous day (to check for any structural abnormalities that my last echocardiogram might have missed). Two catheters were used in my surgery, one on each side of my groin. One was a mapping catheter, which took "pictures" of the inside of my heart. This info was somehow combined with the data from the previous day's MRI to give my doctors a super-accurate picture of my heart - the technology is absolutely amazing. The other catheter was the "business end" which did the actual ablating. In my case, a Medtronic Arctic Front cryo balloon was used.
My surgery was a phenomenal success. After the procedure, while I was still in recovery, Dr. DeLurgio shared some scans of my heart with my wife and family. These images show the electrical activity of the heart represented by color:
http://s28.postimg.org/jz01x31dp/heart.jpg
The left side is pre-ablation. You can see that my heart looks like a thunderstorm, and that's certainly how it felt. The right side is post-ablation, and shows 100% normal electrical activity. It's like my doctor hit the reset switch on my heart, and it's now operating like it should, after decades of herky-jerky rhythm.
The big question now is, how do I feel? In a word - cured. They told me that some Afib would be normal while the scar tissue forms, but as of today, 3 days post-ablation, I haven't had any Afib at all. A few blips of SVT, but nothing like what I experienced before. I'm hoping that this is a trend that will continue.
Immediately following the surgery, my heart rate was higher than I was used to (96-100 resting, 115 when I was up and walking), but that quickly settled down to the mid 80s, and by the following morning, my heart had settled down to a comfortable 75bpm, and I was released from the hospital. Today my pulse is in the low 70s. I was able to half the dose of beta blockers I was taking, and was also able to discontinue the medicine I was taking for high blood pressure.
I'm following my doctor's advice and taking it easy for the first week post-ablation - resting a lot, not lifting anything heavy. My groin is a little sore from the catheter on the right side, but the tightness in my chest is gone, and best of all, NO AFIB! Words cannot express how happy I am. My experience with ablation is a textbook example of everything going perfectly, with the best possible outcome. Of course, your mileage may vary. But like I said before, choosing the right doctor and hospital made all the difference. If your doctor says you're a good candidate for ablation but you're on the fence because, well, it's heart surgery - don't be. Knee surgery would be harder on you (and probably riskier as well) than a cryo ablation. If I continue to feel as good as I do today, I'll be singing the praises of the cryo ablation for the rest of my days.
SO glad to read about your awesome experience! And so glad to hear that there is thusfar no afib..let's hope that continues FOREVER! Everything you said is wonderful advice...bigger hospital, more experienced EP. Enjoy this first week off and then get back to exercising (not too much at first! But you can get more and better advice on working out from Paul and Petey than I could ever give you). Then just sit back and enjoy NSR!
Bill
Congratulations on your successful ablation and thanks for describing your experience.
I am very happy for you that everything went well and you are feeling great now (except for the groin pain which will go away shortly).
I am pretty sure that you will be okay and in NSR from here on. I had similar experience with my ablation. Mine was a combination of cryo and RF. My EP told me he will use cryo for large areas and would use RF for touch up and hard-to-reach areas in the heart. So far so good for me after 14 months.
The only thing which happened to me was that I had internal bleeding in the puncture site, which grounded me for over 3 months with lots of pain in my right leg. That was the hospital's fault and NOT the EP. The internal bleeding happened after the procedure and the nurses did NOT recognize it for 4 hours. They just gave me pain killers for the pain in the leg for 4 hours :-)
For your info, I did NOT sue the hospital because I believe $hit happens and they did NOT do it on purpose. The hospital learned from it and I am sure they trained their nurses for it. But, I went through hell because of it.
Again, I am really happy for your ablation success. That is great.
Scott
I have some ablation questions. If you arent in afib when they do the procedure how do they know which area to zap? I thought I read somewhere that they look at your heart to see where the activity is occuring. But if your paroxysmal it seems like theyd have a harder time doing that.
Also in reading various comments some people are diagnosed and have ablations within a year while others such as yourself have many years in between. I assumed the standard order of things is to try rate control, then rhythm control, then ablation when that fails. Is that correct or do some doctors just go straight to ablation?
My EP first suggested antiarrhythmics, but I told him I wanted to go straight for the ablation. My thinking was that I'd rather not waste time treating my afib with drugs that would likely lose their efficacy over time (I'm only 38, with hopefully many more years to live) when I might be able to cure it with ablation.