Do you always go to the hospital when you have tachycardia?

My HR goes up to 105 just when I get startled, or wake in the morning. My HR lowers a lot when I'm sleeping and usually is 40, sometimes 30. I exercise and my heart rate can go up to 130 or 140. I just keep track on my Apple watch and drink electrolytes. My tachycardia sent me to the hospital when it was over 220bpm. The last time my HR jumped to 220 I did not want to go to the hospital and did different things to get it down. I took a Flecainide, which I take for my arrhythmia anyway, as a "pill in the pocket." I did the bearing down technique, as well as focusing on deep breathing. I slapped cold water on my face and neck. But the thing I did that worked the best was putting my face in a bowl filled with ice and water. Take 3 deep breaths and on the 3rd one, put your head in the water. Hold your breath for as long as you can and then pull your head out. My HR, which was at 190 at this point, dropped to 100 in the matter of about 45 seconds. It's scary when you go into tachycardia, and super expensive when you have to go to the ER. For me my HR can jump from even a tiny bit of adrenaline so I'm working on keeping my so called, cool.

I’ve had good success with the modified Valsalva maneuvers in resolving SVT episodes, at home and in the hospital ER where they showed me how. If I have a different arrhythmia, they don’t work so well and I resort to a pill in the pocket. The choice of rescue meds will depend on your individual circumstances, including other meds you are taking. Good luck!

Just keeping you in the loop after my ❤️doctor appt yesterday. Since I was in normal sinus rhythm, he was not as concerned about my racing heart. He did take me off amlodipine and started me on Carvedilol to hopefully keep my heart from racing. I checked drug interaction and found it and it has a moderate interaction with two other drugs I take..not surprising. But I am going ahead and trying it. I plan to be around the house in case there are any serious side effects. I really appreciate being part of this caring community. Thank you.

@marianne103 do you have high blood pressure? Keep us posted!

Yes, I take irbesarten and diltiazem for hypertension.

No. Never.

You do not need to go to the hosiptal @ 104, IMHO. I have ventricular tachycardia and fibrillatio, been to 104 many times, I take Concor 5mg first, if that doesn't work I take Cordarone 200mg if stays more than 30 minutes.

My cardiologist told me to go to ER and get a EKG so he can tell me what type of tachycardia it is, A FIB , V TACH, etc. Got an attack a few months ago but walked it off after a couple hours. Max bpm about 140 normally low 50s. Maybe next time .

I've gone to three different ERs when my heart rate remained over 140 for more than three hours, as advised by my cardiologist's office. But apparently the only thing the ER can do for you is rule out a heart attack. Once that's done, you'll get hooked up to a monitor and have to lie on an incredibly uncomfortable gurney for six to eight hours. In my experiences, I never received any care and I was discharged with the same pulse rate I had when I arrived. All I got was a miserable bad back. I stopped going.

T is reassuring to hear that not every or most tachycardia events require reps to the ER. As a 77 year old woman, recently diagnosed with sinus tachycardia(also have paroxysmal aFib), I am interested in what others have to share. Thank you.