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Series Code: UP
Program Code: UP000061A
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00:16 The ticking of a clock, waves on a shore,
00:20 the cycle of night and day, 00:22 even the seasons create a rhythm. 00:25 I call it the rhythm of life. 00:27 Your heart needs rhythm too. Stay tuned... 00:31 I'm Dr. James Marcum, are you interested in 00:34 discovering the reason why? 00:36 Do you want solutions to your health care problem? 00:39 Are you tired of taking medications? 00:42 Well, you're about to be given the "Ultimate Prescription" 00:47 One of the first medical skills I learned as a child was 00:50 to find my heart rhythm. 00:52 I checked my neck or my wrist and, of course, 00:55 I had to check everyone else's neck and wrist 00:57 even the dog's. 00:58 Each time I did, I'd offer my diagnosis, "You're alive!" 01:02 I'd say with genuine joy. 01:04 There's something reassuring abut that steady thump, 01:07 thump, thump of our heart, but steady isn't guaranteed. 01:11 You can damage the rhythm, and when we do, 01:15 watch out! 01:16 Dr. Marcum, I've got some questions from the 01:18 heartwiseministries.org website for you today. 01:21 Are you ready to make some diagnoses? 01:22 Well yeah, Charles, I am, but first of all, 01:25 I think that what you said earlier is a great skill, 01:28 so let's teach everyone in our listening audience how to 01:31 sort of check their rhythm 01:32 of the heart. Well let's do it, yes! 01:33 Some people might not know how to do it. Yes 01:35 Well, one of the easiest ways to do it is to put 01:38 your fingers below your thumb and feel that steady beat. 01:43 After a while, that's your radial artery beating, okay, 01:47 and what happens is the heart pumps and then 01:51 blood moves throughout the body. 01:52 You can check it other places too. Yes 01:54 Anyplace you feel a pulse and rhythm. 01:55 And what you want to do is hold your finger over that 01:58 and, first of all, see if it's regular, if it's a regular 02:01 pattern or jumping all around. 02:04 It's regular, regular. Good, it's regular. Yeah 02:05 And the next thing I do is I count for 15 seconds, 02:09 and then multiple it by 4. Okay 02:12 And, you know, an average heartbeat, 02:14 if you're a great athlete, your heart might 02:16 be running in the 40s. 02:18 If you're sick and you need it to go faster, 02:21 it might run as much as 120, but the first thing is 02:24 you want to make sure it's regular, a regular rhythm, 02:27 and then you'll want to see how fast it's running... 60 02:30 That's a normal heartbeat and it's regular, 02:33 so I would say your rhythm is stable. Good 02:35 Now sometimes the rhythm might feel like it's doing like this, 02:39 jumping around... that's an abnormal rhythm usually 02:42 from the top of the heart because you can feel it. 02:45 That means when you can feel it, that means blood pressure 02:47 is still going out throughout your body. Right 02:50 And if it feels irregular, there are several 02:52 different types of rhythms it can be. 02:55 Sometimes it's irregularly irregular, 02:58 we call that one atrial fibrillation. Yes 03:00 Sometimes it's just fast and just a straight fast one 03:03 can be a normal fast rhythm; 03:05 it could be one called "atrial flutter;" 03:07 it could be one called "supraventricular tachycardia." 03:11 Sometimes you have a normal beat and then you feel 03:13 sort of a skipped beat. Yes 03:15 We call that a "premature atrial atrial or premature ventricular 03:19 contraction." 03:20 Those are rhythms usually that you feel in your wrist 03:23 come from the top part of your heart. 03:25 The bottom part of your heart is not supposed to 03:27 generate rhythms - it's bad when that happens. 03:30 When that happens, there's something serious wrong, 03:32 and usually you lose blood pressure and pass out. 03:35 So usually those type of rhythms, you just hit the floor. 03:38 And hopefully, you have someone that can come 03:39 with a defibrillator and shock you very, very quickly. 03:42 So these are some simple things you can do... 03:45 if you have rhythm problems just measure your heart rate 03:47 and see how fast it's going. 03:48 Of course when it goes real fast and regular 120-130, 03:53 the first things I think about.. is there some stress 03:55 on the body? You know, did they just 03:57 finish running? 03:58 Do they have an infection? Are they having pain? 04:01 Are they losing blood? 04:02 A very fast heartbeat is a symptom to me 04:05 that the body is under some type of stress, 04:08 and I have to find out what that is and that stress 04:10 might be from yelling and having an argument. 04:12 See, I'm not letting... no, I'm not letting you 04:14 scare me this time... I've been waiting for that! 04:16 I knew you were going to try... 04:17 Or it might be from having pain, boom-boom-boom! 04:19 Or it might be something like a disease; 04:21 you might be losing blood, you might have a fever, 04:24 you might have some type of other problem going on. 04:26 You break your leg, your heart 04:28 is going to go fast, that's pain. Yes 04:29 The chemical that does that, we've talked about before, 04:32 that's adrenalin - epinephrine. 04:34 That not only makes your heart go faster, but it makes your 04:36 blood vessels constrict to help deal with disaster to get 04:40 blood where it needs to be if it worsens. 04:41 And pain can cause that reaction. Yes 04:43 Pain can cause that and anything that puts stress 04:46 on the body makes the stress chemicals to go up 04:49 which can actually speed up your heart. 04:51 And, hopefully, these wires do what they should 04:54 and there's symmetry behind it, but sometimes 04:56 there's not a symmetry; sometimes when we get older, 04:59 it goes too slow and it doesn't ever speed up. 05:01 Now that's sort of the battery, the wires sort of getting old, 05:04 you know, like a car battery. Yes 05:05 Every so often the car battery runs out of juice, 05:08 the car can't get going. 05:09 Well that can happen within the heart. 05:11 The problem is, with the electrical system of the heart, 05:14 is the electrical system causes the heart to squeeze and pump, 05:17 and it pumps life-giving blood with oxygen and nutrients 05:21 throughout the body. 05:22 So it's a very important thing that we're talking about today 05:25 and everyone out there should be interested in it 05:27 because everyone has a rhythm... I hope! Yes exactly! 05:30 If you're not having a rhythm, we have a problem. 05:31 Let's set a baseline here... If we are sitting in a chair, 05:36 and we're 20 years old, and we are just resting in a 05:40 chair - it's in the evening after a day's work, 05:42 and we're just relaxing... what should be our 05:45 heart rate at that time? 20 years old 05:48 If it's a regular one, 40 to 60 would be a good number. 05:51 If you're not in shape, carry a lot of weight, 05:53 a resting heart rate will be faster, it might be 70 to 80. 05:56 If a resting heart rate is above 100, that means something 05:59 probably is not wrong and the stress, it might be just from 06:01 not exercising or it might be for something like, you know, 06:05 have extra weight - that can cause it. 06:06 Certain stimulants can cause your heart to go faster. 06:09 The most common ones are caffeine is a stimulant, 06:11 and nowadays believe it or not, Charles, 06:14 a lot of people drink energy drinks. Yes 06:17 I went into the store the other day and there were some 06:19 teenagers at this 7-Eleven that I was at, 06:21 and they went right up, it was before school started, 06:23 and they got 3 or 4 of these little bottles and they drank 06:26 it down and that will speed up your heart too. 06:29 Over-the-counter cold medications have substances 06:31 that speed up your heart rate. 06:33 Now when you speed up your heart like that, 06:34 does your body respond by giving you more energy 06:36 or is it artificially... Artificial! Really? 06:38 There's nothing real about it. 06:40 You know, I can make your heart 06:42 go fast too if I bang you on the head all day. Yes 06:44 That's not a good thing to do. 06:46 So the heart goes fast for reasons. Yes 06:50 And you want it to be for the right reasons, 06:52 and other than that, you don't want your heart to go fast, 06:54 you want it to keep a nice slow rate to keep you at rest. 06:57 The heart has to rest too, it can't go fast all the time, 07:00 and that's why it's so important that when we're under stressful 07:03 situations, that we also have times of rest. 07:06 And we've talked about this before, this world is so 07:08 stressful, the rhythm needs to rest too, 07:11 the heart needs to rest, our body needs to have to rest. 07:14 So part of a good rest is having the heart slow down. 07:17 Now let's take that same 20-year-old and let's add 07:19 40 years to him and now we have a 60-year-old 07:21 or 70-year-old sitting in that chair after his day at work, 07:24 should there be a different rate or does it... 07:26 It's according to their overall physiology. Okay 07:29 If they're an exerciser, usually it starts staying the same. 07:31 Now as we get older, usually the rhythms of the heart, 07:35 if the conduction system slows down, 07:37 usually it goes a little bit slower. Okay 07:38 But for athletes and someone that's in great physical shape, 07:41 the heart is going to go slower 07:43 because it works more efficiently. Oh okay 07:45 A person that's in less physical shape, 07:47 the heart tends to run faster. 07:49 So if you want to check your physical fitness, 07:51 here's something I do quite a bit, 07:53 you know, people that want to start exercise programs, 07:55 and we check the rhythm of the heart, 07:56 I'd say, "Well listen, measure your resting heart rate 07:59 before your exercise program and after 4 weeks, 08:02 and you watch and it gradually slows down, 08:04 that means you're helping your cardiovascular system 08:06 out, you're lowering the stress chemistry of the body." 08:09 You see how this stress thing works... 08:11 You lower the stress chemistry, you turn on other nerves. 08:14 The parasympathetic which is the opposite of the 08:17 stress system in the body, that's the rest system 08:19 in the body because God sort of made us to work hard 08:22 and to rest, that gets activated more and your body 08:25 has a greater chance to heal and rest to feel better. 08:28 Now let's talk about the other end of this thing... 08:30 How fast should our heart go? 08:32 What is the range of exercise, running up the stairs 08:36 or being chased by a tiger, is there a top limit? 08:39 There is and sort of the generalized standard, 08:42 if you take 220 minus your age, okay 08:48 that's about the fastest a heart can go on a general rule. 08:53 So let's say you're 60 years old, so 220 minus 60 08:57 and that's about how fast your heart would go... 09:01 the fastest under a normal situation. 09:04 A normal stressful situation, it can go that fast 09:07 to meet the metabolic needs of your body 09:09 when it's under that amount of stress. All right, very good. 09:11 And hopefully it's not under 09:12 that amount of stress a whole lot. 09:14 For instance, you know, like a 20-year-old, so sometimes 09:16 they can go up to 200 on a 20-year-old. Yeah 09:18 So the rhythms are very important of the heart, 09:21 but usually rhythms mean different things. 09:24 But I think that thing is great. 09:25 You know, when I feel bad, we frequently, I check 09:29 my heart rhythm to just make sure it's a regular rhythm 09:31 because I can rule out a slow heart beat if I'm not 09:34 racing away against, oh probably not infection... 09:36 Because a slow beat or a fast beat can cause other types 09:39 of symptoms in you that may not be connected to something else. 09:42 It's just because of the heart working... Right 09:43 And any time, when you're really, really sick, 09:45 the heart is going to respond. 09:46 Your body is going to respond by usually a fast heart rate. 09:49 So if I feel bad and like I'm sick at my stomach 09:51 or I'm worried about something and I put this and my heart 09:53 still going at 60 beats per minute, 09:56 I can probably notice that there's not something 09:58 serious going on. Okay 09:59 But I feel bad and my heart is going 120, 10:02 I go "uh oh," my body is under stress, it's trying to 10:06 fix something that going on. 10:07 I might be sick, I might want to see somebody. 10:10 You know, I might want to do something. 10:11 I want to make sure I'm not dehydrated, 10:13 and my blood sugar is not too low, 10:15 something else is stressing my body, I don't have an infection, 10:17 I don't have pain or something else that's doing it. Okay 10:20 So this is a very useful biometric to check on the body. 10:24 Well we have a good baseline now for both 10:26 how fast and how slow it should be going 10:28 under normal circumstances and that's good. 10:31 All right, let's get some questions here from the 10:33 heartwiseministries.org website... 10:35 "What is normally prescribed for a person with 10:37 atrial fibrillation." 10:39 What are you prescribing? 10:41 Is there anything they can do naturally with this? Yeah 10:42 And atrial fibrillation is the most common abnormal rhythm 10:46 that I see in the office every day. 10:48 And that is the top part is irregular, an irregular rhythm 10:53 and it goes really fast in the bottom part because all these 10:55 signals come down irregularly goes fast too. 10:58 It's called "atrial" because it comes from the top. 11:00 "Fibrillation" because the top part is fibrillating. 11:03 Are they in sync with each other? No 11:04 Oh they are not in sync with each other. 11:06 No, so this one is going this fast and all these signals 11:07 coming through - there might be 300-400 signals coming 11:10 through - only a certain amount will get through like 180 11:13 will get through, so the bottom part goes faster too. 11:15 And it's a very discomforting rhythm... 11:17 A person might feel their heart pounding, 11:19 they might get dizzy, they might get short of breath. 11:22 It's estimated that 10% of older people have this. 11:25 One in 3 strokes come from it, so the real solution 11:29 is finding out what's causing that to happen. 11:31 If you can find out what is causing that, that's great. 11:33 Lots of things can cause that. 11:35 Anything from thyroid to genetics, to bad heart, to heart 11:38 attack, to stress, to stimulants, there's a big list. 11:41 The first thing we do is try to find out the cause; 11:43 we slow the heart rate down so they don't feel so bad, 11:46 and then we have to address the blood-thing issue. 11:49 And then after that, we use a bunch of medicines 11:51 to slow it down and we can also talk about 11:52 whether we want to put the heart back in rhythm with a shock. 11:55 There's some fancy procedures we can do, fancy medicines 11:58 to sort of maintain rhythm, but all those things have risk. 12:01 Sometimes we can even go up inside the heart 12:03 and destroy that rhythm if we need to... 12:06 But it's all really according to the cause. 12:08 I had a person that the cause was sleep apnea. 12:11 They wore the sleep mask at night, 12:12 and their heart rhythm became much easier to control. 12:15 So that's a very good question so prescribe for a person 12:18 with sleep apnea... medicines to slow it down, 12:20 keep it in rhythm and probably blood thinners 12:22 until we can find out what is causing it. 12:24 If we can figure out what's causing it, 12:26 then they might not need to take these medicines long-term. 12:28 And quickly, what are some of the causes that could be again? 12:30 Oh, thyroid, any type of stress, bad heart, dehydration, 12:36 genetics can cause it, high blood pressure, valvular heart 12:39 disease, lots of different things can cause it. 12:42 All right, well very good. 12:43 We're going to take a short break and when we come back, 12:44 more questions from heartwiseministries.org website. 12:47 It's so important that we know about our heart, 12:49 that we understand what is normal and what isn't because 12:52 we only have one heart and if that heart goes, so do we. 12:55 We'll take a short break and when we come back 12:57 more questions and a Bible text for today, so stay tuned. |
Revised 2016-02-15