By Karen Stokes
September marks National Atrial Fibrillation Awareness Month. Atrial Fibrillation (AFib) is a quivering or irregular heartbeat that can lead to blood clots, stroke, heart failure and other heart-related complications.
It is estimated that currently up to 6 million Americans experience Afib. Which in the general population works out to about 2 percent.
Sam Aznaurov, MD Medical Director, Cardiac Electrophysiology ProHealth Heart and Vascular Center
(Photo/ProHealth)
“AFib is a disease associated with aging and wear and tear of the heart. That risk gets higher the older you get. It’s estimated that in folks 65 or older it’s upwards of 10 percent. These days we’re living longer, more of us are getting AFib. By 2030, about 12 million Americans will be living with AFib,” said Dr. Sam Aznaurov, MD Medical Director, Cardiac Electrophysiology ProHealth Heart and Vascular Center.
In addition to advanced age, other risk factors for AFib include high blood pressure, underlying heart and lung disease, congenital heart disease, and increased alcohol consumption. Although AFib may be a permanent disease, various treatments, and risk modifying strategies have been developed to help reduce the risk of stroke in patients that remain in AFib, according to the American Heart Association.
“There is no standard set of AFib symptoms, it is a very individual disease,” explained Dr. Aznaurov. “There are some common trends we can see, some people may have zero awareness of any kind of AFib symptoms, some people have asymptomatic AFib. Those people are rare. The majority of people don’t recognize their symptoms as AFib. Subtle things like fatigue, you generally feel fine but if you do something like mow the lawn or climb some stairs it’s taking more effort than it usually would, unfortunately some people may chalk it up as aging.”
Dr. Aznaurov continued, “First thing people notice is a fast heartbeat, people will say they can tell that their heart is racing, there’s an irregularity. Other symptoms may be chest discomfort, sometimes even mimicking a heart attack. People can feel short of breath or significantly light headed and even in rare cases lose consciousness due to lightheadedness. Those are the most common symptoms.”
A common way to find out if a patient has AFib is if they have a stroke or a transient ischemic attack (TIA). People with AFib are up to five times more likely to have a stroke. Stroke is the fifth-leading cause of death and a leading cause of serious, long-term disability in the U.S., despite being largely preventable, treatable and beatable.
“The number one potential way that Afib can actually kill somebody is by causing a stroke, the way in which Afib can actually disable somebody is by causing a stroke. The number one priority in treating Afib is to further clarify that individual patient’s stroke risk because not everybody’s stroke risk if they have Afib is the same. We do have risk prediction models that can put people in relatively low and relatively high risk categories and try to address that risk,” Dr Aznaurov said.
To prevent harm, the number one thing doctors can do is treat the patients stroke risk with medication. There are other alternatives such as surgical procedures that can be performed.
In discussing lifestyle changes to prevent Afib, Dr Aznaurov acknowledged that either smoking, chewing or using tobacco contributes to AFib. Recreational drugs that include cocaine, methamphetamine as well as some prescription medications can contribute to Afib. Alcohol absolutely contributes to Afib. Alcohol is toxic to the heart. No amount of alcohol is considered healthy. Anyone who has taken more than one or two alcoholic drinks on any given occasion could be considered unhealthy.
“Another contributor is animal protein and animal fat in our diet,” said Dr Aznaurov. “There is a believable amount of evidence that suggests that a vegan lifestyle is associated with lower AFib risk. People living that lifestyle are generally going to be more health conscious as a whole. It may be more of a correlative than an association.”
Dr. Aznaurov concluded that Afib is a very individual disease lifestyle contributors to Afib are very individual and the decisions about therapies are individual and I think that that’s where it’s not as simple as looking at online sources to make decisions about your care. You have to be willing to talk to your physician and are you willing to put forth the effort.