PVA

June 7, 2003

Dells PVA was an act of courage. He faced many hurdles and overcame

them.

He wanted his life back and stuck to it. His experiences were exceptional. At

the other extreme. You have those who have a PVA done and within a couple of

months are cured and getting on with their lives. Without any complications or

minor ones at best. I am one of those lucky ones. Having a PVA done requires

the want to have your life back and having the most experienced EP you can get

to perform the PVA.

You want to ask your EP. What is your success rate for complete recovery.

What's your criteria for a complete recovery. What's your stenosis percentage.

Does your EP have a good supportive bedside manor or is he a horses ass. Mine

was little of both!

Rich O

June 7, 2003

Dear Rich O,

Thanks for the kind words of praise. I just wanted a cure. It was more a

matter of necessity than an act of courage. As I said in my monologue, I had

over a dozen places to ablate, most people have one or two. I knew that from the

previous studies on my heart. Remember that my afib pulse rate was over 240

at times. That is why I HAD to wait for the new mapping technology.

I guess what happened to me might scare some people, and if so I am sorry.

Please all remember how bad getting afib can be, being afraid (as I was) to

go to sleep for the fear of afib or a stroke â€¦ and being on those lousy drugs

with their nasty side effects loss of brain power, fatigue and vision problems

for years. You guys all know the list...

Yes, mine were the ablations from hell, and my Doctor, Grant Simons, was

excellent. He wrote a case study on the complexities of my cure. A few years

ago, I had no hope of a normal life.

Now I have no afib. I would do the ablations again and again until I was

cured.

That decision would be made again in a heart beat.

July 28, 2003

Greetings from Vancouver, site of the 2010 Winter Olympics. It's

funny that whenever I am in AF or have recently experienced an

episode, I seem to gravitate to this support group website. It's

just plain comforting I guess. My story is like many of yours. I am

a 45 year old male in good general health. I have been experiencing

an AF episode approx 3 times per month for the past 5 years. My

episodes last between 3-15 hours, with most in the 4-5 hour range. I

get extremely uncomfortable when I have to go to bed and I am still

in AF. I have until this year, taken 25 MG of Atenolol each day (was

50mg)and a 81mg aspirin. Speaking with my cardiologist in May, we

decided that the Atenolol was not preventing the episodes, it was

just lowering my heart rate when I was experiencing an attack. It

was also slowing me down. We decided to take the Atenolol only when

I had an attack. I am feeling better that I am only taking this pill

3 times per month. However, I also have hiatus hernia and he

prescribed nexium to settle my stomach down. This has helped quite a

bit, and I would say that my Af episodes seem to be less since going

on this pill. I believe that I have Vagal AF. I have tracked each

episode for the past 5 years, and most seem to happen after eating

dinner. It also happens when I have an extreme adrenalin rush

(skiing down a black diamond run). I cannot seem to shake the feeling

that I am going to die when I have an episode. It is extremely

disruptive to my lifestyle, and is beginning to affect me. I went to

see Dr Yeung at St. 's hospital. Dr Yeung is the specialist

in Vancouver who performs PVA's. He informs me that his success rate

is now about 80% which is what the Cleveland Clinic is promoting. I

would be interested in communicating with any members who have had an

experience with Dr Yeung. My caridologist believes that the

procedure is still too new, and I tend to agree with him, although

each episode moves me closer to have the operation. The jury seems

to be out as to whether circumferential PVA vs potentials is the

preferred method of PVA. Dr Natale seems to use the circumferential

technique and the group in France uses the potential or linear

method. I am not an expert in this, it is just what I have read. I

am aware of significant advances by a Canadian company called

Cryocath in using cold catheters rather than burning tissue. It

appears there are also a number of US companies exploring this method

as well. I am disturbed by the poor results that this support group

is showing for PVA's vs what the industry is selling (ie. 80% success

rate). Would be interested in hearing from anyone who can council on

how to deal with this problem mentally. I find that my mood sours

immediately when I am in AF, and stays that way until NSR. I would

like to stay positive but it wears you down after a while. Sorry for

the long post. If anyone wants to reach me offline, my email is

brianbernstein@...

Cheers,

July 29, 2003

p.s. about being uncomfortable when going to bed in afib, I prop

myself up on pillows, this makes me more comfortable and seems to

reduce the incident of heart stuff. I think someone posted that they

sleep in a recliner at those times.

July 29, 2003

,

A person by the name of Bill Leathem, I believe, had an ablation by

Dr. Yeung. I have not heard from Bill for some time but when I

searched the archives, the last message I saw was around 6 months

post ablation and Bill sounded like he was doing very vell and

optimistic about the future.

Do a search on the archive for leathem and you might see something.

I am looking at a second ablation in May 2004 in London Ontario.

good luck

keith

August 7, 2003

I have been living with LAF for 13 years. It ruined my USAF flying

career, and I think is one of the reasons why I am so moody

sometimes. I am in it a lot but it is a fairly mild erratic beat

compared to what some others in this group have experienced. Meds

always work for a while, then become less effective to the point that

I need to change to something new. I have tried just about

everything, and had a TIA in February, so I have now decided to have

the PVA or isolation procedure. There is a new article available on

the American Association of Cardiology website under the media July

2003 news releases. The article was written by Pappone, et al. from

Milan Italy, who, along with the French, appear to have been at the

cutting edge of nonpharmacological treatment of AF. The article is

encouraging. I don't have the article in front of me now, but I

think they used circumferential versus potential, with no incidences

of stenosis. Although it is a nonrandomized study, the group was

large (almost 1200, including a control group of 600 on antiarrythmia

medication) and the follow up time averaged three years, with some as

long as five. The survivability and quality of life differences

between the control group and the ablation group is quite

remarkable. It is the most comprehensive large study I have seen in

this area. Worth reading if you are considering options.

Best of luck.

Trevor

> Greetings from Vancouver, site of the 2010 Winter Olympics. It's

> funny that whenever I am in AF or have recently experienced an

> episode, I seem to gravitate to this support group website. It's

> just plain comforting I guess. My story is like many of yours.

<snip>

August 7, 2003