holter heart monitor
Things haven’t been quite fun enough lately, so you can imagine how thrilled I am about going to get this contraption attached to me today. Will have to wear it for 24 hours (not sooo bad, I think the last time back in 2007 it was for 48 hours). Anyhoo, this is all a result of the 4-hour tachycardia thang last July, but this time my doc at the hospital seems determined to get to the bottom of why I’ve been getting tachycardia for more than 25 years. And although it’s an annoyance, maybe she’ll actually find out and be able to stop it from happening. The other reason is because chemo can damage your heart (along with everything else in your body) so it is prudent to make sure my heart is sound in case I have to go back on chemo in January.
It’s always something…
heh. I just took mine off and took it back to the cardiac lab an hour ago. Now I have the horrid salt sucker rings on my chest.
I hope we BOTH figure out what the hell’s going on with our rhythm.
You too! Must be all the rage this season. I’ve got my appointment to get it stuck on at midday and hope I can arrange to take it back in the evening tomorrow so I can get my chemo port flushed out at the same time. Multitasking…
I now have “I’ve Got Rhythm” as an earworm.
Who could ask for anything more!
I recall when my dad had to wear one of these. He had to wear it because of a problem that slowed down his heart, but the slower heart caused him to hallucinate and in his delirium he kept pulling off the monitor….arghhh. A pace-maker helped out the whole situation very quickly.
It seems my problem isn’t that my heart goes too slow, but that it will kick into overdrive for no reason that can (so far) be found. Glad your dad’s problem got sorted.
The last time I saw one of those, back in the 1980s, my boss was toting it around and it was the size of a lunchbox. Looks like they’ve at least downsized em.
It’ll be interesting wearing it out to the wine tasting this evening…
Thinking of you and hoping your day goes well
xx
Its always good to find the reason for this.
My mother has had this test a number of times. Her most memorable was when she had to wear it in the hospital. She was sitting there reading Châtelaine magazine when suddenly the room filled with staff along with a Crash Cart…
Apparently, her monitor battery suddenly stopped and that triggered a Code Blue…. They all had a good laugh and she went back to reading.
At least that thing doesn’t DO anything – a 24hr BP cuff inflates on the hour every hour. Such a lovely thing to be woken up by at 2am. And 3am. And 4am..
Plus after a while you start to get pinpoint bruising underneath and it really starts to hurt when pressed repeatedly.
Good thing Dr is on the ball though and following through on stuff.
Ooh, I think I had one of those BP things after the emergency op. But I was so fucked up over the awful nasal-gastric tube (to suck gack outta me) that I barely noticed it. That NG tube was HELL itself. By the third day I was almost hysterical and so they finally took it out.
In comparison, the Hoster is a walk in the park…
Because of my tumour working the way it did, i had the 24hr BP cuff quite often. In the hospital, the only problem with it was that it was set to raise an alarm if your BP wasn’t healthy – mine wasn’t.
So every hour the BP alarm would go off, ring (cause it’s loud) for about 20 minutes before someone came to turn it off, then go off again in 40 minutes for another 20 minutes. And people wonder why you don’t rest in hospitals!
After the surgery (abdomen, but keyhole) I spent every night in the hospital vomiting. That was less than fun.
Now, an actual walk in the park would be nice.
So sorry to read you had a down day yesterday when everything got on top of you & then to follow that today with having to wear this heart monitor for 24 hours & then yet another visit to the hospital tomorrow … well …!! I do hope they will get to the bottom of what’s causing your tachycardia episodes & if necessary treat it … it’s amazing how quickly medical science moves forward on so many fronts that maybe this time round they will come up with something. I remember the difference between my two cataract ops & they were only 15 months apart!!