Getting Up to Speed

My son was born with Supraventricular Tachycardia that would have killed him as an infant if it weren't for the meds Digoxin and Inderal (see poem).  His cardiologist weaned him from both by age two and said he should never have problems again.  The statistics at that time said a third of all children born with the condition would grow out of it.  I thought we were out of the woods until Julian was six and felt his heart race.  When he was born, the doctors at CHOP told me to take a bag of frozen peas and place it quickly on his forehead to shock his system out of the arrhythmia.  Taking that information to heart, I used it then with success.  I also immediately scheduled an appointment with his then Cardiologist at  DuPont.  He said the attacks weren't occuring enough to warrant medication.  Also, the side effects would not be worth dealing with.  He said to have Julian bear down (strain) like going to the bathroom and that should break the arrhythmia.  He started doing that the few times a year he would have the tachycardia always with success.  I thought everything was managable.  Then a few weeks ago, he was complaining of a racing heart and bearing down was not working.  After a few minutes, I thought of the frozen peas trick and got out a bag.  After two tries,  it didn't work.  I thought to myself--what else was there besides the ER?  And let me mention here, my local hospital/doctor knows nothing about heart arrythmias in children.  By the time I would wait to be transported to CHOP, it would be faster to drive there myself.  So I just kept trying to break it by shoving frozen peas in his face.  After a few more minutes, it worked.  That scared me.  I scheduled an appointment then with the DuPont cardiologist for January.  Then, Julian's therapist recommended I try CHOP and see if I can get in sooner.  It was the best advice I got this year.  They seemed much more on top of things there.  For instance, when I called to schedule an appointment, the receptionist said a nurse would call me to make one.  When the nurse called me, she reviewed his history.  She asked how I stopped the last episode of tachycardia.  I said after bearing down didn't work, I put frozen veggies on his face.  She laughed.  She said that's something they used to tell mothers to do to their infants.  The idea of a boy getting an old infant treatment amused her.  She joked, "Well, if he never eats vegetables, you'll know why!"  She said he needs to be seen not just by a standard cardiologist but an Electrophysiologist.  Here's a definition: Electrophysiology is the study of the electrical properties of biological cells and tissues. This is the first time I'd ever heard of one. She asked me when was the last time he wore a holter monitor (a device to monitor his heart rate for 24 hours)?  I said not since he was two.  It was something I was going to request, and it made me all the more confident for this visit that she asked first.  I'm excited to see how different this condition is treated since I was plunged into knowing about it as a young mother.  The nurse got me in for next week.  I have learned that sometimes it's better to go with the name brand (CHOP), especially when it concerns your child's health.  But now I have a problem...what am I going to do with all those frozen peas? :)