Скачать или смотреть Palpitations: When to worry?

Palpitations are the sensation of feeling your heart، beating unusually fast, or hard, or irregular. It can feel like fluttering, pounding, or skipping beats. Although this might be alarming, but they are often harmless.

Palpitations can be caused by stress. Severe anxiety and panic attacks can trigger palpitations with shortness of breath and sweating.
other causes of palpitations are Caffeine, Nicotine, exercise, and pregnancy.

Some medical conditions such as overactive thyroid, anemia, low blood sugar, or dehydration, can lead to palpitations as well.

Also, palpitations may be a sign of some heart conditions, such as abnormal heart rhythms like atrial fibrillation or mitral valve prolapse.

You should seek medical attention if you are having palpitations with chest pain, shortness of breath, dizziness, or fainting.

To determine the cause of palpitations we do a heart tracing ECG, blood tests and an ultrasound of the heart called echocardiogram. Also, Holter monitor which is a device that can monitor your heart tracing over 24 hours.

Treatment depends on the underlying cause. Of course, you should avoid caffeine, nicotine and sleep 7-8 hours every night. In serious cases, we use medications called beta-blockers to reduce the heart rate but for serious irregular heart rhythm a procedures called catheter ablation may be required to regulate heart rhythm.

Video shot by Galia Helbaoui and edited by Amer Helbaoui