Hello all-
As with many of you I am posting because my post-ablation course has not been smooth. As background, I am a surgical oncologist and not a cardiologist, but have some medical background and understanding. To Kitt- thank you for moderating. Your health challenges are unique compared to us on this forum, and I wish you luck in your journey back to health. I treat a lot of colon cancer, and it is no walk in the park.
I am an amateur bike racer (very amateur). It is a passion, and my palpitations were preventing me from competing, or even riding with my bike team. So I had it evaluated, atrial flutter/ fibrillation is what it seemed. I did not want to do medication, and I wanted to ride my bike. So I had a flutter ablation, realizing that it may not work, but that it was easier than a fibrillation ablation. Bottom line: it didn't work. For the first week I had chest pain (?pericarditis), significant shortness of breath, fatigue, and worse palpitations. It is slightly better now, but I am in a very similar situation than before the ablation. Today I walked up and down 26 flights of stairs to induce the arrhythmia- which turned out to be the same as what it was before the ablation (flutter/fib). Still cannot ride my bike as I would like. In the grand scheme of things not a huge deal, but a significant quality of life issue for me. I'm hoping that with time things will improve, but reading on this forum I have serious doubts about that.
I have two comments to make; one general and one very specific to "whitenight".
The general comment is: there are thousands of ablations performed every year. So while we are all very concerned regarding people's experience on this forum, and other forums negative experience, we don't really know what the denominator (or population of people undergoing ablation) is. It may be that the vast majority of people are helped, and thus do not seek out this information, or post on these forums. I don't know, but its a real possibility.
The specific comment to "whitenight": not sure if you will read this, I hope you do. You got 14 years of good outcome from your first ablation, like "kyheart" pointed out. Now you further cardiac issues, and you are thinking of getting a lawyer. All I can say is that you should be ashamed of yourself. I hope you do not pass this absurd level of entitlement on to your children (if you have any). As a physician really trying to help people, and often times dealing in gray areas, patients don't get the outcome they wish, or they have complications of their treatment. In fact, the majority of us on this forum would fit into this category, otherwise we wouldn't be here. While I am sure there are some unscrupulous physicians out there, I would think that the vast majority are just trying to do the right thing, in a less than perfect world. It's partly people just like "whitenight" that are driving health costs in the USA through the roof, forcing physicians to practice defensive medicine. Nothing is perfect, and there is NO TREATMENT WITHOUT A COMPLICATION, even asprin. There is a health care provider shortage looming in our country, to a large extent because of entitled people like "whitenight". And a financial crisis looming in our country for some of the same reasons (as well as some amazing moral-less folks on Wall Street).
That's it. Last week I read "whitenight"'s posting with disbelief, and just felt that I had to respond. But also put it out there that perhaps the majority of people are helped, and people considering the procedure may want to think about that. And that is coming from a patient who has NOT been helped by an ablation.
Best of luck to all.