Hi Betty, yes I can answer that question, I thought i gave a response a few days ago,Got to love technology. Anyway I apologize for that. First off I don't have afib mine was called Vintricular Tachycardia or VT for short. It affects the lower part of the heart which is the main pump. From when I would go into an arrhythmia or basically a rapid pulse usually so fast no blood is moving. If it stays in that state more than a couple of min you can be basically in full blown cardiac arrest. So that's why seconds count and if the pacemaker could not get the heart back into rhythm the defibrillator part would shock me from the inside just like they do from the outside. This is all setup ahead of time and certian settings would see the arrhythmia evaluate the best treatment and deliver it.

Now with the ablation yes they can be done with the pacemaker temporarily shut off by a technician while the ablation is going on. That part is similar to afib is that they are trying to find the bad paths that cause the heart to go out of rhythm, then ablate those by burning or freezing the nerve ends to eliminate then from causing the problem. Hope that explains your questions. Please feel free to ask anything you like. I look forward to hearing how they decided to help you