Your heart is an amazing timekeeper, expanding and contracting about 100,000 times each day. Arrhythmia alters this natural rhythm. While everyone's heart skips a beat at one time or another, a heart rate that is too fast, too slow, or too erratic needs medical attention.
Kinds of arrhythmias:
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Bradycardia means your heart beats less than 60 times a minute |
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Fibrillation means your heartbeats are rapid and chaotic.
Ventricular Fibrillation is the most serious kind of arrhythmia, and can lead to sudden death.
Atrial Fibrillation is when the heart's two small upper chambers (the atria) quiver instead of beating normally.
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Heart Palpitations can give you the feeling that your heart is racing, pounding, or "flopping" in your chest. For some people, they are a symptom of deeper heart problems. |
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Premature Ventricular Contractions (PVCs) are extra heartbeats caused by the heart's lower chambers (ventricles). |
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Tachycardia means your heart beats faster than 100 times a minute.
Ventricular Tachycardia is a rapid heartbeat that starts in the lower portion of your heart, or ventricles.
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