My Heart Is In My Throat...Literally

Nurses General Nursing

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OK...someone please help me. For the past 2 years I have been getting these weird palpatations, and it feels like my heart is beating in my throat. When it happens, I feel very lightheaded, like I may faint. It usually goes away in about 10 minutes. It used to happen every few months but now it happens every few weeks. IT usually happens when I bend down, but somtimes I will be standing there doing nothing. It happened at work and I put the pulse ox on my finger and it said my HR was 185. I checked it myself and got 180. So I had a nurse double check and it was. It happened the other day at my mom's and my HR was 220! It happened again yesterday. Also, I have been getting chest pain...not bad, just noticeable, even without the palpitations. I am afraid to go to the doctor because a) it might be something bad or B) it may be nothing and I will feel like an ass. It is NOT anxiety, either. It happens when I am doing nothing or bending over to tie my shoes. Please someone tell me SOMETHING. HAs anyone else had this?

Specializes in CVOR,CNOR,NEURO,TRAUMA,TRANSPLANTS.

Break down and go to the Dr, find a cardiologist you like and trust and tell him whats going on. He wont think your nuts or just looking for something to be there. They will take you very seriously. I have chest wall angina, have had it since I turned 30, it scares the crap out of me everytime it decides to go "OFF" it hurts like someone is kicking me in the chest like kicking a football. Its full force, and it has brought me to my knees more than once. When it first started I thought of everything else but the obvious, I didnt want it to be my heart (which it isnt) its chest wall, nothing to do for it but deal with it. A cardiologist that I knew looked at me and happend to be on the floor when I went into one of the good ones, in no time I had an ekg 12 lead on me in the break room of the floor. We caught it on ekg and he looked at it and from there I was fitted with a halter monitor and an echo from there, he was very concerned because I had been on phen phen and thought maybe I had MV damage.

Now I just monitor to see if there is any change from the usual chest wall pain. I have a long and immediate cardio problems in my family so its important that I watch for any change.

I do hope you feel better soon, just go to a specialist and let them do diagnostics to find and locate the problem and solve it.

Zoe

Specializes in ED staff.

Sounds like PSVT to me, go to the doc, get your thyroid checked. If you take any OTC cold meds these could be implicated too. If you were vagal, your heart rate would be slow like in the 40's. Usually these things can be prevented with meds or with ablation therapy, Get checked out...soon!

i have also been having episodes of exactly the same symptoms, flo1216.

the last time it happened my husband had just left for work (an rn shift) and i was lying on the couch, freaking out, as i had been having the 'heart in throat palpitations' for 35 minutes, looked at my young kids playing innocently nearby, and thought, 'wow, if something happens to me now, what will they do?'

with them as my motivation, i drove myself down to the local emergency department, had an ecg, turned out it was svt, probably caused by stress and caffeine, not that i'd had a coffee that day, but anyway.....

this has been happening now for about 2 years, each bout lasting longer and longer, and the next time it happens i will be on a holter monitor.

it's very scary at the time, so flo1216, please get it checked out!!

short and sweet

get thee to the dr's office pronto

Flo...please get checked out. Stay in touch and let us know what you find out and how you are doing...

Specializes in MS Home Health.

Your first goal for 2003 is to do the above, wear a halter.. and have a stress test. I am sure that is the starting point for you. Check with a doc ASAP.

renerian

Thanks, guys. I wonder if it can be from ephedra? Sometimes I take it when I work out or have a lot of do, for extra energy. I don't take more than it says to. I take less. The palpitations also happen when I am NOT taking them though, in fact the usually happen when I have not taken them. Don't yell at me, please. I have been taking ephedra since high school and never had any problems until now. It may not have anythingto do with it.

Oh, I tried coughing to break it but it doesn't work. It usually just subsides on it's own in about 10 minutes. I always feel shaky afterward and tired. But does anyone think it is weird that it usually happens after I bend down?

What about an event recorder, instead of a holter monitor? Isn't that for occasional arrythmmias? I don't think it would show up on a Holter because it doesn't happen everyday.

Ephedra can cause rapid arrythmias so first stop taking ephedra. Then go to the doctor for a full lab work up & cardiac testing. There are other tests besides a holter monitor that can elicit the arrythmia & record it. It sounds like SVT - supraventricular tachycardia. If youre feeling faint when it happens, you are symptomatic. Youll look more "stupid" ignoring signs and symptoms than if you got them checked. Do you want to be coded on the floor at the nurses station when you finally do pass out?

Flo, what JT said!! EPHEDRA??? NO WONDER!! Get yourself off that stuff PRONTO! Of COURSE that can cause your heart to go wonky! So can too much caffeine, they both overstimulate the heart. Also, do you take decongestants/antahistamines? I once accidentally took 2 Clartrin Plus a few hours apart, and it kicked my heart into ventricular trigeminy. I'll never forget the look on my doc's face when he heard THAT beat through his stethescope!! :D Thought his eyebrows were going to disappear into his hairline!

Your symptoms sound almost like my husband's attacks of A-fib, though why you should be having that at your age is beyond me. (He has mild CAD and angina.) Anyway, you really need to get it checked out! It ain't just 'nothing' and you shouldn't be ignoring it in the hopes it will go away. As for the bending over, I have an ASD (hole between the atria) in my heart, and bending over can do strange things to my heart. An extended gardening session will sometimes cause it to beat irregularly, though not in the manner you describe. Too bad...I find weeding VERY therapeutic! :o

You need to see a cardiologist. I had some "symptoms" for a very long time that I ignored. I went to the ER twice for heart palpitations because they were so bad that they made me feel nauseous. They put me on a monitor for an hour and sent me home saying it was only a few PACs and not to worry and to stop drinking caffeine. I felt like an idiot. I also could feel my heart beating in my throat whenever I bent over. I have been on BP meds for about 6 years and still have a hard time controlling my BP. My normal heart rate was always over 100.

Finally, one Sunday I had an episode of bradycardia that scared me. My heart rate was in the 40's all day and I felt very light-headed. I called my MD the next day, went to see him, and he referred me to a cardiologist. But did I go? No. It was summer and I was supposed to go to NY and help my parents move. So, I did, and packed and lifted boxes, and carried all kinds of heavy things. When I went back home, I saw the cardiologist. I told him that I had had SOB for as long as I can remember, and about the bradycardic episode, also tightening in my chest frequently that I attributed to stress.

He did some tests that showed nothing, then sent me for a treadmill stress test. I thought I was going to die. In less than 15 seconds, my heart rate was in the 180's, I couldn't breath, and my BP was soaring. They got me off the machine and I was lucky they didn't have to used the paddles one me. The next day they did a heart cath and found that I had a 100% blockage of the LDA. The only reason I wasn't dead was because somehow over time I had built up a lot of collateral circulation. They did a CABG right away, and now all of those symptoms I had ignored for such a long time are gone. I was 49 but had the symptoms for several years before the stress test.

So all that to say this - don't wait! Go see a cardiologist!

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