Dr. Kaplan provides advice to help women with heart arrhythmias advocate for their health. Dr. Kaplan is a board certified Cardiovascular Disease and Clinical Cardiac Electrophysiology at Banner Heart Hospital in Mesa, Arizona.
Dr. Kaplan:
If you are suffering from heart arrhythmias it may be difficult for you to put into words exactly what you are feeling and to be able to make that clear to your physician so that your doctor can know who you should see as a sub-specialist or how to further investigate that problem.
Palpitations or irregular heartbeats that you are feeling maybe characterized as being rapid or slow. They may feel as if the heart is pounding or skipping beats. It’s helpful if you try to check your pulse when you are feeling palpitations to see if you can notice any sort of a pattern. It’s important to note whether the heartbeat is more forceful or less forceful, whether it is even or erratic and whether the rate seems to be normal or abnormal.
It’s also helpful for you to be able to note whether you have any associated symptoms. Do you feel short of breath with it? Do you feel light headed? It’s very helpful to be able to characterize for your doctor what circumstances these rhythm problems are occurring in. Do they tend to occur with physical activity or perhaps while you are at rest? Do they occur early in the day or late in the day? Do you find that they are occurring in association with meals? Is there any variation in the rhythm disturbance pattern based upon the calendar and especially with relationship to your menstrual cycle?
By telling your doctor what is going on and what you are feeling you can better help give him or her an idea as to what rhythm problem you may be suffering from. This in turn will help in guiding the evaluation that you should receive and can also help in terms of you requesting referral to a cardiac electro-physiologist or a heart rhythm specialist.
About Dr. Andrew Kaplan, M.D.:
Dr. Kaplan is a cardiac electrophysiologist at Banner Heart Hospital in Mesa, Arizona. After earning a Bachelor of Arts in Biochemistry from Washington University in St. Louis, Mo. in 1983, he attended medical school at the University of Texas, Southwestern Medical School in Dallas, Texas. He later went on to do his residency in Internal Medicine, at Duke University Medical Center in Durham, N.C. Dr. Kaplan did cardiovascular and electrophysiology fellowship at Emory University School of Medicine and served as Chief Resident in Internal Medicine at the Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta.
Keywords:
Conditions: Arrhythmia, Supraventricular Tachycardia, Cardiac Rhythm Disorders
Related Terms: Palpitations, Heartbeat, Estrogen, Premature Beats, EKG, Premature Contractions, Irregular Heart Rhythm, Echocardiogram, Syncope, Cardiac Death
Expert: Dr. Andrew Kaplan, Andrew Kaplan, MD, Cardiology, Dr. Andrew J. Kaplan, M.D., Doctor Kaplan
Expertise: Electrophysiologist, Heart Rhythm Center, Robotic Catheter Ablation, 3D Heart Mapping, Arrhythmia Treatments, Heart Disease Prevention, SVT, Sinus Node Dysfunction, Sick Sinus Syndrome, Long QT Syndrome, Tachycardia Syndrome (POTS), Atrial fibrillation, AFIB , Hansen Robotic System, RF Radio Frequency Ablation, Cryoablation
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