A-Fib Post Valve Replacement Percentages?

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A month or two ago, somebody posted a link to a university study on post-OHS (or post-AVR?) A-fib, maybe at Duke University, that gave numbers I found surprisingly high. Something close to 50%, can't remember exactly. I also saw another study, maybe done here in Toronto, that showed that post-OHS Magnesium supplementation cut the rate of A-fib down, maybe in half. Definitely Mg, not Potassium (K), in this study.

Me, I had a brief episode in the CICU maybe ~1 day post-op. (I was told, I didn't notice.) Then at home, 3 wks post-op, I took an ambulance trip to the ER at "my" hospital for V-tach (~150 bpm) & A-fib. I'd had a bug, cough and fever for a week, then it faded, but I suddenly felt like garbage, dizzy, a bit nauseous, weak as a kitten. I'd been eating more Boost/Ensure garbage than real food for days. Eventually I gently collapsed onto the bathroom floor, HR ~150.

After a few hours of thinking and preparing, we called the ambulance. By then I could walk down the stairs and down the walk and into the ambulance, but still HR ~150.

At the ER, they started with a short of Calcium Channel Blocker (CCB?), which brought my HR down. At that point they said that the A-Fib had become A-flutter. (Just what IS the difference??) Then they gave me a Rx for Metoprolol (2 x 25mg/d), double the dose that I'd been on in the hospital post-op. I probably should have stayed on it, but the resident cardiologist at the hospital had a better idea and had taken me off it, probably a mistake. My blood sugar was also somewhat high in the ER (like 9 instead of <4.5), but nobody seems to think that the BS was my problem.

I stayed on the Metoprolol until ~3 months post-op. Then a 48-hour Holter showed no A-fib or other problems, so I dropped the Metoprolol, and also the Warfarin that I'd been on for the 3 months post-op.

I felt lots of heart beats post-op, including lots of PVCs. I don't think I ever actually felt the A-fib, I just felt like #$%^&.
 
I had fairly frequent A-fib before my AVR and so I had a concurrent Maze procedure. Post surgery I did have two quite significant (hours long) episodes while I was still on the bisoprolol but when I was petitioning the doc to let me off he had me wear a Holter monitor for 48 hours and said that the results were 'bizarrely' regular. I came off the Beta Blocker and haven't had an episode of it since. Oddly enough, prior to the surgery I used to have a sort of feeling, which I can't really describe, right before A-fib would start. I still get the feeling but those errant signals never get where they were going so I don't get the beats.
 
Yeah...the one thing thar DID work on me was my good old ryrhmic self. Was it
Because I went OFF coenzyme Qq10 and 4 days later I got A fib??? Frightened me into Amioderone like THAT...didn't even seem to know wHAT even what coenzymeQ10 WAS down there...! So, on crappy amerotione.
ameorterdone(apparently... while have had this low grade 99 degree-99.7 (huge for me) and NO ONE is Paying a bit of attention. Gad!!! Heart surgery and everyone loses their common sense?.. So busting out with Kephlex, don't know what else to do...take it for tooth/ mouth pre-dentists stuff, everyone of my friend are sick, won't see my real Cardiologist for until Monday...my chest hurts a little...just saw how sick and hopelesscfeeling can be worse than anything. Well, blazes, here's hoping kephlex get the bad guys the blazes off me!! I'm just at witscend, cardio Monday. Michelle
 
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It's important to differentiate between how many people get AFib temporarily from surgery and how many keep it long enough for it to be chronic. You're out of the hospital in days (hopefully), but it takes at least six months for it to be considered chronic. Most cases go away long before that happens.

Be well,
 
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