Diagnosis Wenckebach
I had a brief foray into illness this week. I'd had palpitations for several days that I tried to ignore because I was doing night shifts. A weird heart-jumping feeling that makes me want to hold onto my chest.
By Tuesday night they were really bothering me, so my friend Mel was going to do an ECG, but of course by the time we'd started another Medical Emergency Team call went off. So we trundled off to the wards instead.
The next night I actually did get an ECG, revealing: DIAGNOSIS WENCKEBACH. The arrhythmia with the JT soundtrack!!
I was a bit freaked out. The nurse in charge saw my trace on the monitor and tried to send me home. I went to ED to ask them to do some bloods. They were like, "Sure, we'll take your bloods…whilst you are in a cubicle on cardiac monitoring until morning!" I didn't want cardiac monitoring and a code blue went off. So I walked moderately fast to the code, cos running gives me palpitations, and ran the code with a surreptitious hand on my chest.
After that it was a hectic night till morning. I finally went down to ED, had bloods and an echo. Jason came to the hospital to be supportive. The cardiologist said I have a high grade Wenchebach (high grade!!), which is probably benign because I'm young and not collapsing. A phenomena of young athletes! Young athletes with high vagal tone!! Too bad I'm not actually a young athlete.
Jason drove me home humming, "Diagnosis Wenckebach (AV type I mobitz)….My PR interval it elongates…."
And then the best part- Jason bought me gelati!! Perhaps I should get sick more often.
By Tuesday night they were really bothering me, so my friend Mel was going to do an ECG, but of course by the time we'd started another Medical Emergency Team call went off. So we trundled off to the wards instead.
The next night I actually did get an ECG, revealing: DIAGNOSIS WENCKEBACH. The arrhythmia with the JT soundtrack!!
I was a bit freaked out. The nurse in charge saw my trace on the monitor and tried to send me home. I went to ED to ask them to do some bloods. They were like, "Sure, we'll take your bloods…whilst you are in a cubicle on cardiac monitoring until morning!" I didn't want cardiac monitoring and a code blue went off. So I walked moderately fast to the code, cos running gives me palpitations, and ran the code with a surreptitious hand on my chest.
After that it was a hectic night till morning. I finally went down to ED, had bloods and an echo. Jason came to the hospital to be supportive. The cardiologist said I have a high grade Wenchebach (high grade!!), which is probably benign because I'm young and not collapsing. A phenomena of young athletes! Young athletes with high vagal tone!! Too bad I'm not actually a young athlete.
Jason drove me home humming, "Diagnosis Wenckebach (AV type I mobitz)….My PR interval it elongates…."
And then the best part- Jason bought me gelati!! Perhaps I should get sick more often.
Comments
Post a Comment