UKH

Wondering if anyone has any experience of the following issue. I am seeing my doctor about it, but thought it would be interesting to hear from others. My heart rate is dropping from 130/140 bpm during exercise to 60/80 bpm, staying low for anything from five minutes to ten or so, then going back up. This cycle repeats itself during the exercise duration. My exertion stays relatively constant. 
Any thoughts?

Jerry

In reply to Jerry67:

Obvious question.. what are you using to measure it? If you don’t sense that in your body, I’d suspect your measuring device is on the blink/connection is poor? This is pretty common with wrist based HR monitors. Chest straps should be more reliable in general.

In reply to minimike: That’s what I thought, but have used various monitors and chest straps, all do the same thing.

In reply to Jerry67:

Ok. No idea then.. ask a medical professional! Which you are..

edit: google suggests it’s fairly common and can be vasovagal syncope (benign) or cardiac arrhythmia (not benign) so you’ll probably need an ecg and maybe a 72hr monitor. I guess..

In reply to Jerry67:

Have you tried checking your pulse by hand? This should give you an idea of whether your rate changes, or the monitor isn't picking it up right. The fact that you describe approximately halving the rate makes me wonder if the monitor is not picking up every beat.

You only need to count for 15 seconds then multiply by 4. You would also notice is your heart rate is irregular. My dad's was, but the monitor only showed a slow rate. When I checked by hand it was clearly very irregular. 

In reply to Spidermonkee:

I'd agree. Check your pulse manually to see whether it correlates. You'd expect to feel a bit odd if your heart rate halved when you were exerting yourself at a constant level. 

In reply to Jerry67:

You'll never walk alone

In reply to Spidermonkee:

Yep, done pulse by hand and I get the same roughly as my monitor.

In reply to mik82: I do feel a bit light headed when it drops, so have been told not to exercise hard, slow and steady for the moment.

In reply to Jerry67:

In my limited knowledge of cardiology, it sounds like a sino-atrial node dysfunction.

This node is the hearts pacemaker and it can go awry.

Brother in law had it and it was corrected by ‘burning’ the node via a tube up his arm under local.

He was sorted after two treatments, which I’m glad about, as it was quite disconcerting hill walking with him and him saying ‘hang on, me hearts going off.’

In reply to Jerry67:

Have you checked with a watch and counting your pulse?

Edit: Note to self read thread before posting.

In reply to Jerry67:

I'm not a doctor or medical in any way, but all sounds normal to me except the "going back up". Which sounds distinctly odd to me