How Do Doctors Know When You Pace Maker Battery Is Low

If you and your md decide that a pacemaker is the right handling for your condition, your intendance team will explicate how the small, bombardment-powered device volition exist implanted under your pare and how information technology will work to monitor your heart charge per unit and send electrical signals to your center.

Earlier you receive a pacemaker for a cardiac arrhythmia such as atrial fibrillation, your medical team will make sure you are aware of how the device works as well as any limitations to your normal activities that will exist necessary later the process. Here we review some general information about pacemaker implantation.

Testing Earlier Pacemaker Implantation

Before your pacemaker procedure, your doctor and medical squad will recommend various tests to confirm that yous are probable to benefit from having a pacemaker:

• Electrocardiogram (EKG or ECG): This quick, painless test measures the heart's electrical action and records whatsoever disturbances in heart rhythm. Larn more than about how an EKG works hither.
• Stress Test: Sometimes your dr. will recommend that a stress exam be performed along with an electrocardiogram to monitor your centre's electrical activeness during physical activity, such as walking on a treadmill or riding an practice bike. Larn more than about stress tests hither.
• Echocardiogram: This exam uses audio waves to create a motion-picture show of your heart. The information provided past this examination can aid your doctor see the center's chambers, walls, muscles and valves. Learn more than about how an echocardiogram works here.
• Holter Monitoring: Your doc may recommend that you wear a device for several hours or upwards to 2 days as you get about your regular routine. The device, called a Holter monitor, records your heart's rate and rhythm. Learn more than about Holter monitoring here.

Depending on your overall health and any risk factors, your doctor may recommend other tests as well.

How a Pacemaker Is Implanted

Pacemaker implantation procedures are performed in a hospital and may accept several hours. A specially trained cardiologist, called an electrophysiologist, leads a squad of health professionals who work in the electrophysiology (EP) lab. You tin learn more nearly electrophysiologists and atrial fibrillation care teams here.

Before the process, you will exist given a sedative to help you relax. The expanse where the pacemaker is to be inserted volition be numbed, so that you will not feel the procedure taking identify. Your electrophysiologist will implant tiny wires, known as electrodes or leads, near your collarbone. These electrodes will be guided through the veins to your eye. Once the electrodes have been delivered to the eye, your electrophysiologist will identify them inside your heart where they tin can evangelize electrical impulses to the muscles of the upper and/or lower heart chambers. The pacemaker'southward battery and the circuits that create the electrical impulses (the pulse generator) will be implanted below your skin, not far from your collarbone.

One time your pacemaker has been successfully implanted, your medical team will probably recommend that you stay overnight in the hospital. During your hospital stay, your electrophysiologist will program your pacemaker to fit your needs, considering your heart status and activity level. Several follow-upward visits volition be scheduled to make sure the device is operating correctly, and to talk with you lot near how the pacemaker is working for you.

After Your Pacemaker Implantation Procedure

Your electrophysiologist will provide recommendations concerning your activities following implantation of the pacemaker. In general, these recommendations will depend on your overall wellness, hazard factors and activity level. It is likely yous will non be immune to work out strenuously or lift anything heavy until you accept received your doctor'southward approving. Your doctor volition want to see you regularly until he or she is certain the pacemaker is operation as it should and your trunk has adapted to it.

Wearing a Medical ID Bracelet or Necklace

Later on you receive your pacemaker, your medical team may recommend that you vesture a medical ID bracelet or necklace to let emergency personnel and other healthcare providers know that you have a pacemaker. Call back, your pacemaker will be invisible beneath your skin. If you lot are always in a position where you cannot speak for yourself, this information volition help first-responders and others treat you appropriately.

Your doctors may too recommend that y'all keep a printed card noting the type of pacemaker, when information technology was installed, the condition information technology treats and all contact information for the doctor. The American Heart Association has developed a downloadable card yous can fill out.

Monitoring Your Pacemaker

You should also have regular cheque-ups with your medical squad so that they can monitor your health and the condition of your pacemaker. Make sure to proceed all appointments, every bit regular monitoring is an essential function of confirming that your pacemaker is functioning correctly, and that your heart is responding as it should.

Technological advances have made information technology possible for some medical devices to be monitored using the telephone or the Internet. If this is an pick for your pacemaker, your medical squad will explicate how information technology works.

Your Pacemaker's Battery Life

Pacemakers are powered by an internal battery that typically lasts 5 to 10 years. Pacemaker batteries are formulated to requite adequate discover before they lose their charge, so you exercise not need to worry that your pacemaker battery will all of a sudden die and the pacemaker will finish working.

Y'all will not feel any symptoms when your pacemaker's battery needs charging. Even so, because you volition be having regular bank check-ups with your doctor, he or she will find the low bombardment in the course of the regular exam.

When your pacemaker'southward battery is running low, your electrophysiologist will supersede the pulse generator of the pacemaker. Just equally with the original procedure, you lot will exist given a allaying to relax you lot and the insertion and removal site will be numbed. During the process, the doctor may also elect to replace one or more of the leads that evangelize electrical impulses to the heart. In general, replacement procedures take less time than initial pacemaker implantation.

Life with Your Pacemaker

No thing how well your pacemaker is working, the most important factor in its continued success is you lot. A heart-healthy lifestyle volition provide your eye with optimal weather for good health, and will let the pacemaker to take its maximum benign issue. Talk to your doctor near the post-obit:

• A middle-good for you nutrition
• Getting enough exercise
• Moderation with alcohol
• Quitting smoking

As always, you should take good advice with your dr. and your medical team. Inquire all of your questions. To aid you get started, we have gathered answers to many of the questions that are often asked about pacemakers. To review them, click here.

Learn More About Pacemakers

To larn more nigh pacemakers, check out these SecondsCount articles:

• Pacemakers & Atrial Fibrillation
• Answers to Mutual Questions About Pacemakers

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Source: http://www.secondscount.org/treatments/treatments-detail-2/your-pacemaker-procedure-what-to-expect

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