I haven't been here lately, fortunately haven't felt all that bad up until recently. I was diagnosed in 2009 with afib, having had 2 episodes the first year, each under an hour and converting on my own. EP put me on Rythmol and finally my cardio doctor took me off of the Rythomol, which wasn't agreeing with me, and put me on Cardizem 120 once daily plus aspirin. I haven't been bothered much with afib, only what I would call a short run of palpitations, lasting under 5 seconds and that was rare. About 3 or 4 weeks ago I woke up in the middle of the night with a racing heart. It wasn't afib, it was fast but regular. Panic would automatically set in and make it worse, but it would go away after 5 or 10 minutes. It wouldn't happen all the time, but enough to bring me to my doctor. He ordered a holter monitor, an event monitor, but also one that would automatically record anything unusual while sleeping. I was fine the first 2 weeks, had nothing to call in, but this morning I woke up at 5:30 with my dog, fell back to sleep at 7:00 and woke up at 9:00. When I woke up at 9:00 there was a beep from the monitor altering me to the fact I had an event to call in. I did call it in and I could tell by the sounds it was fast..and the woman said there were actually 4 events (it will hold 5, so it stopped after 4), but they can't tell me what it is only that it was nothing to be alarmed about. My question is this, is an SVT considered an afib episode or is it entirely different? I have no heart conditions other than the blasted afib! Naturally it's Wednesday and my doctor isn't in so I can call him and find out exactly what the reading was. Now my stress level is high thinking I may be getting ready for an afib attack, and the stress isn't going to help either. Has this ever happened to anyone else, where they would get a rapid heartbeat in the middle of the night, or during sleep? Is there a difference between a panic attack and rapid heart rate?
Thank you..wishing you all a wonderful day!