AV Node Ablation Pros and Cons

My husband has Atrial fibrillation also. We have gone through all of the things you have done. Drugs, cardioversions, he has been breaking through so he now has had an success ablation that stays until he has some other procedure. The cardoversions convert to NSR easily. His Cardiologist says he may need another ablation in the future, but now cardioversion works easily.

Thank you for your response!
Glad your husband is stable.
Cardioconversions usually work but are temporary. Hopefully, no more post ablation. And yes, as with me, often need more than one.

I'm a soon-to-be 82-year-old male. I've had A/Fib for the last several months and one cardioversion last November, which worked for four days; it was performed at the Meijer Heart Center in Grand Rapids, MI. I'm slated for an on-site review of my records and additional tests at the Mayo Rochester Clinic on 15 February. I'll be fitted with a heart apparatus for a day, echograms, etc. I'm curious as to how many ablations are okayed after the pre-exams.

I think it all depends on how first one goes. The older you are - the more “tweaking” - second or third ablation needed.
Depends on your particular situation.

Every patient is a sample, and not representative of the general population. Each heart behaves differently to different interventions. So, a skilled EP will carefully evaluate the salient factors and put together a plan for remediation. Often, medications such as beta blocker and anti-coagulant take care of the bulk of the problems, most especially the symptoms. Some people, like me, can't deal with the symptoms. They are too intrusive and raise anxiety. This is what an EP is for (electro-physiologist). An EP also wants to extend your life, and keeping arrhythmias of all kinds is a good way to do that. If rate control (beta blocker) and anti-coagulant lose efficacy over time, which they often do, then a more mechanical fix is indicated, and that would normally be at the very least a pulmonary vein isolation (PVI) which is the area of the re-entrant signals in the vast majority of cases. But, there is also the left atrial appendage occlusion procedure to keep blood out of the appendage and to reduce risk. Even, possibly, allowing the person with an otherwise great CHAD2s score to go off of both medications. Some people do not tolerate them well, and this goes for statins as well, which many get prescribed because the original physician seeing you worries about ischemic heart disease.

An AV node ablation destroys the AV node's ability to act as a fail-safe heartbeat inducer. It isolates the node because sometimes it develops re-entrant paths that work against the other interventions. IF it is isolated or actually destroyed, then a pacemaker is needed to stand in for it.

Doctors prefer that other co-morbidities and disorders are under control before they place you under sedation and disrupt body functions and tissues. Such actions place stress on the system, and that doesn't help underlying problems, and may advance them. In an outright emergency, you may have much more to lose, so they'll act in that case. But AF and tachycardia won't generally kill you soon, although VTAC is quite dangerous, even in a few hours. VTAC is nothing to trifle with, or argue over. But about whether your circumstances might impact on your surgery, that depends on severity and on prognosis, and on the doctor's confidence and skill level, not to mention experience. This is something to discuss with that person.

Thank you gloaming for your response. Have you had AV Node ablation?
Regards, Dalewhit

No, but I have communications with a woman who has a history of heart disorders that would make your skin crawl if you understood all she has had to endure the past ten years. It's truly awful. Her user-name is susand over on afibbers.org. She had her AV node ablated some time ago, but she has other co-morbidities and arrythmia problems still ongoing. She's the toughest person I know, let alone toughest woman. If you are interested in more information, I suggest you look into a topic search on that site's forum and see what you find useful for your purposes.

Thank you again for such useful info. I will try to reach Susand.
Dalewhit