Explaining A-Fib

“Some patients will say, oh man I can feel it coming on, and they will have palpitations, and they will have to sit down, and it’s really bad. Other patients, they’re playing tennis and golf, and they have no idea it’s happening,” said Dr. Paul DiGiorgi, a cardiothoracic surgeon at Lee Health.

Atrial fibrillation is a common heart condition that doctors say affects people differently. “It is an arrhythmia where part of the chambers of the heart don’t beat properly, the fibrillate. The main pumping chambers, the ventricles, they beat normally but the upper chambers are not beating at all, they’re fibrillating,” he said.

This can put patients at risk for heart failure and strokes. “Patients can have up to a 35 percent chance of having a stroke in their lifetime with atrial fibrillation if it’s not managed,” said Dr. DiGiorgi.

Many patients with atrial fibrillation or A-Fib for short experience shortness of breath, chest pain, or fatigue—but others may have no symptoms at all. “Unfortunately, about half of patients with atrial fibrillation don’t know they have atrial fibrillation,” he said.

Things like medication, surgery, and lifestyle changes can help to improve A-Fib. “All these disease processes that we see with the heart start with lifestyle management. How you eat, how you exercise, how you take care of yourself, in general, will have a huge impact on if you have the disease in the first place and if you do have it how you manage it,” Dr. DiGiorgi said.

Doctors say things like weight loss and limiting caffeine and alcohol can help patients better manage atrial fibrillation.
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Видео Explaining A-Fib канала Lee Health