AWadd618

Having suffered from a recent increase in the severity of my palpitations, I thought it wise to request another Holter monitor from my cardiologist.

I am a 26 year old male, good BP, good cholesterol, no history of heart problems in the family except for my father has some high BP (which, as I said, I do not). I exercise about 1hr each day, perhaps 90 minutes if I have time. I do a combination of cardio and weight training - I am fairly lean, 6 feet tall and 160lbs. I do not smoke, and I do not drink. I eat a very healthy diet.

Now that the basics are covered, I should mention some details about my background with palpitations. I have had them for about 5 years, and I have had a myriad of tests: 2 Standard Holters, 3 Event Monitors (King of Hearts), 2 Echos, and a Stress Test. I have also had all the blood work you can think of.

Recently, I was given a great opportunity to try out a new, 14-Day continuous recording Monitor Patch called a "ZIO" Patch. This amazing monitor records everything for 14 days, and has a button very much similar to a King of Hearts for which to identify the palpitations you feel. It is actually water resistent, and you NEVER take it of. It is a single-piece, very light (no wires, nothing like that)...just a sticker on your chest.

Today, I spoke with my cardiologist about the results:

- 13 days, 6 hours of recordings were delivered
- 6 Hours were "artifacts" (unreadable distortions) and could not be used for diagnostic purposes.
- A total of 75 Premature beats (72 PACs and 3 PVCs) - which she told me is a very low amount, only about 5 a day.
- No other irregular beats were recorded.
- According to the monitoring company's record, I recorded 75 'events'

The problem is, when I returned the monitor, I had actually recorded 125 events. I had pressed the button 125 times, and I had written down, in a log, each and every event that happened. Thus, somehow I am missing 50 "button-presses" or events that I did, in fact, want to have examined.

This, coupled with the fact that 6 hours of the recordings were Artifacts, leaves me still concerned. If, hypothetically, the doctor had said, "We have 125 button-presses, and 6 hours of artifact data.", I would NOT be worried, because I would know that all the symptoms I felt were picked up. However, the combination of MISSING 6 hours of data and 50 event recordings concerns me. If you do the math, that is about 8 events for every hour that wasn't submitted (based on 50 missing recordings).

When I recorded most of my events, I was exercising, which leads me to believe I am missing a substantial amount of relevant recordings from this 14-day trial. The cardiologist seems unconcerned at ALL.. she says that with only 2% of the data being artifact, we can be pretty sure that it is not significant. My argument was: 'you cannot say it was insignificant because you are missing MORE than just the recordings, you are missing my event triggers, too... and if during those 6 missing hours I had some potentially dangerous issues happening, it could be problem'. She gave me a look as if to suggest, "sheesh, another worrier".

I feel pretty justified in my malcontent about this, but I am curious to know what other people think. Should I really just NOT be concerned? Missing 50 of my events and 6 hours of data seems like a lot when you consider what could have happened in that missing time.

Thanks for any support.