Hey there..

Went for a Bupa health screen today and my ECG showed a few abnormalities – doc thought it could be a enlargement of the left side of the heart…which didn’t sound great.

I’m 39, was a smoker until 35, drink a fair bit and my diet over the past 12 months has been awful. My colestrol is also above what it should be.

On the plus side I don’t have high blood pressure, am only just over my recomended BMI and just in the body fat zone at 19%.

Now the doc has sent my scan off to the cardioligist for review, but given I won’t be hearing for a week or so anyone know if there will be anything I can do about this to put my worried wee mind at easy.

Obviously if its hereditory then I’ll just have to live with it, but if its down to years of unhealthy living can a change in diet, cut out all booze etc fix the issue?

FWIW the doc didn’t seem nearly as concerned as me..whether that is because a simple lifetyle change will sort me out , or whether its because its not her that will drop dead on her next bike ride is up for debate.

Not a doctor, but…

LVH can be caused by a number of things from exercise to hereditary conditions. An ECG can tell a lot, but it needs a very carefully trained eye to read well. I once had a weird reading at the GPs that in the eyes of a cardiologist was quite fine.

Def make sure you follow up with the cardiologist. S/He is the expert.

Common things being common LVH is normally down to high blood pressure, which you would have risk factors for. Diagnosing of an ecg, whilst possible isn’t very reliable. I wouldn’t worry till you have had an echo diagnosis.

An ECG is a fairly blunt diagnostic tool to look for structural abnormalities in the heart. It can point towards issues, but can equally give “false positives” i.e. show an abnormality where none exists.

A huge number of things could look like that on an ECG: “athlete’s heart” (i.e. a well trained endurance athlete), hereditary conditions, ischaemic heart disease, hypertensive heart disease, alcoholic heart disease, and, of course, a normal heart.

An echocardiogram (ultrasound of the heart) would be the next test to look at whether there is any enlargement of the heart (either the muscle itself, or the chambers within, both of which may show as LVH on an ECG). I wouldn’t speculate on anything until you’ve had one of those and seen a cardiologist.

BW,
Legolam/Hannah
A baby cardiologist

Oh but reading your op again you don’t have high blood pressure. I wouldn’t worry at the mo.

What you need to do:

1) Chill out there is nothing you or Internet can do.

2) Get results and explanation from Doc.

3) Ask questions there and then depending on result.

Worrying will get you know where.

You can read up online but don’t worry until you can make a choice based on the results.

You hate waiting – like the rest of us. Keep your mind busy until you get your results.

Good luck with results hope it is nothing to stop you riding.

Earlier this year I had a couple of interesting months after an occupational health test sent me to the GP for some additional tests.

Subsequently, a 12 lead ECG showed signals for LVH and bradycardia, with suggested diagnosis of a right bundle branch block. Bloods and a cgest xray followed, with me crapping myself until I had some time to do some reading of my own.

My blood pressure is a touch high, and I have a degree of ‘athletic heart’. Nowt wrong with me.

What I learned was that the NHS is so used to dealing with unfit and poorly humans, when one comes along that doesn’t fit the standard model of normal (i.e. ‘averagely unfit’) then it’s automatically assumed you’re ill. I’m very glad they explored my ‘issue’ fully, but they were almost surprised that my ‘symptoms’ resulted from me being fitter than average.