Sudden, very fast heart rate

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My 10yo son has had some unusual heart symptoms. He is due to see a Paediatrician about this next week. Ahead of that appointment I’m interested to know whether anyone has similar experience with a child, or if any medics here can suggest what questions I can ask to help get to the bottom of what’s going on.

One night a few weeks ago, he was reading in bed, very calm, when he told me his heart was “going bang bang bang”. I listened to his back and could hear it for myself, and my Braun pulse oximeter told me that his heart rate was 180bpm. He eventually fell asleep but while he was sleeping, his pulse raised even higher, to well over 200bpm.

I took him to A&E that night. His heart rate calmed down on the journey, after about 3 hours in total. The nurses gave him an ecg and took bloods but everything came back clear.

There was one similar incident a year previously (bedtime, very relaxed, heart rate around 170bpm). And there has been one, much lesser, incident since (daytime, playing peacefully with Lego, sudden increase in heart rate which calmed down in a few minutes).

His GP said he’d never come across these precise symptoms before. Has anyone else?

Surprised the GP didn't suggest SVT (Supra Ventricular Tachycardia). Main symptom is sudden very high heart rate at rest.

I'm not sure how much it occurs in pre teens - my DD had her first episode at 12. I don't know if the episode during sleep is typical.

In. Dd's first year of it she had maybe 10 episodes?

It is really good you are getting this checked out. Hopefully your paediatrician will refer to a cardiologist, and it would be helpful if they could arrange a holter monitor for your son to wear to try and capture one of the episodes. It’s hard to speculate what’s causing the episodes of tachycardia, it doesn’t sound like panic attacks if he is calm at the time - but the one thing I would be pushing for is holter monitoring or an event monitor so you can see what’s going on. An echocardiogram is also probably a good move; arrhythmias in a structurally normal heart are much less worrying and an echo gives you a good insight into any structural issues. Best of luck with the appointment.

Sounds like SVT, my DD had it as a baby but eventually outgrew it.

Yy, agree with baby Shambles, although DD never had an episode at the times when she was wearing the Holster so hospital gave us a Kardia. They also said the try to get an ECG when she had an episode so we had to rush to A&E.

I had this when I was younger. I actually don't know the name of it as my mum can't remember but I think it was atrial fibrillation. I remember my doctor describing it as my heart being wired up wrong and instead of the blood going in and out as normal sometimes it would go on a shortcut and end up going round and round via an extra "wire" that shouldn't be there. This caused the fast heart rate. I remember being told it was pretty harmless but I did have an operation to fix it. It was keyhole and they burned away that extra wire. I have been fine ever since. This was a long time ago so there are probably more modern ways to fix it now. Might not be the same thing but it's a possibility

Thank you so much for all the helpful comments. It’s good to be prepared.

My son also has difficulties with insomnia and low mood. Does anyone know of any connection between these symptoms and heart conditions? I’m aware they could be entirely unconnected but interested to know if there’s any possible link.