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I had a abnormal EKG and a strong family history of Heart problems?
My mother had open heart surgery at 66 years old and my father had open heart surgery at 51 yrs. old. My mother's brother had open heart surgery at 62 yrs old. My father's only brother died of a massive heart attack at 48 years old. I have had some problems lately and I'm really concerned about all this family history. My mother states that herself and her brother have what is called LIPO B. I'm not sure what this means. I have an appointment to see a heart specialist on Tues. I sweat so much, can't sleep, dizzy when lying down at night, pain in upper back with grabbing in my chest, headaches, tired all the time. I'm only 48 years old. I've had a stress test and it shows nothing but, the EKG is abnormal. I've had blood work and no work so far. I know I'm overweight and need to exercise, I have high Cholesterol...my parents have this also. Even when I wasn't overweight I had this problem. If you have any input please let me know......I'm not sure what is going on with me.
Public Comments
- With family history like this it's imperative that you start getting regular exercise, losing excess weight and eating a good diet. If you smoke it's critical that you stop. You can't do anything about family history as a risk factor, but you can control many others. See http://www.smart-heart-living.com/heart-disease-risk-factors.html for discussion about and links to various risk factors. Also http://www.smart-heart-living.com/exercise.html for tips on exercising. I especially like the walking page. Great and easy way to start introducing exercise into your life. The rest of the site also has lots of good information about living successfully with heart disease and about living a heart healthy lifestyle. Hope this helps... good luck!
- It depends what kind of 'abnormality' is on the ECG did they tell you what it showed? When you do an ECG most of them have a bit at the top that says normal or abnormal, because it says abnormal doesn't mean there is something wrong with the heart it could still be ok, it takes a trained professional to be able to read the ECG, even many nurses and GP's can't thoroughly interpret them unless they've had some cardiac experience in their career. Its good your stress test was normal, that rules out angina. Your symptoms do sound like something could be going on but at the same time could be something unrelated. At least you're seeing the cardiologist soon, with a strong family history they'll investigate whats going on thoroughly and sort out any problems they find. If you are overweight it is important to try and eat better and get some exercises but don't overdo it until you make sure the hearts ok.
- You have strong family history of heart disease, specifically coronary artery disease. You have high cholesterol and that would make you a fairly good candidate for possible coronary artery disease. EKG's and stress tests are nearly useless tests when it comes to diagnose obstructive coronary artery disease, which is what your family is having and has had. They are about 60% accurate at best conditions. Tim Russett of NBC recently died from a massive heart attack and he had just been cleared by his "doctor" after a stress test. Bill Clinton was another one who was cleared of heart disease by inaccurate and insufficient test like stress testing, he ended up having bypass surgery after chest pain. There are hundreds of examples of people who have gone through stone age testing such as EKG and Stress testing and ended up having heart attacks. Get a heart scan with a CT scanner, either an EBCT or 64-slice CT. I would go a step further yet and set up a CT Angiogram with said machines to rule out obstructive coronary artery disease. Stop wasting your time and run the risk of ending up with the family curse. Do it soon. Easy tests, non-invasive and not that expensive.
- You will need an echo to be done. The echo will see your heart and how your heart is functioning. It will see how the blood flow is throw your valves. If you have any more questions please feel free to IM or e-mail me.
