r/PVCs

It’s really hard to understand PVCs.

After spending more than a month stuck in what felt like a constant 15–20% burden, they suddenly dropped out of nowhere. During the episode, I genuinely convinced myself something was wrong with my heart again. Even though I’ve had phases like this before, this was by far the longest and most mentally exhausting one.

Right now I feel relieved, but at the back of my mind I know PVCs can be unpredictable. They may come back in 2 days, 2 months, or maybe even a year from now. Before this recent flare-up, my burden was mostly around 1–5% for almost a year, with occasional days under 1%, but they never completely disappeared.

What frustrates me most is how random they seem. I recently moved to a new country and haven’t seen a doctor here yet, although I’m still in touch with my EP back home. During this episode I seriously considered finally going for an ablation, but now that things have calmed down again, I’m once again unsure.

I’ve tried so hard to find patterns or triggers, but honestly, PVCs sometimes feel like they have a mind of their own. They start dancing when they want to and stop when they want to.

I mainly wanted to post this for people currently stuck in a bad PVC phase. When you’re in the middle of it, it genuinely feels like it will never end. Mine improved suddenly after more than a month, without any clear reason.

I’m not a doctor, and everyone should stay in touch with their own cardiologist/EP, but I know how mentally draining these episodes can be. I panicked a lot during this flare-up, so I wanted to share something hopeful now that it has settled down for over 24 hours.

Hopefully it stays that way for a while.

Hi everyone,

Im a 19 year old male, 140 pounds. Ive been having PVCs for about 2 and a half years now. it started off as bigeminy with exercise, but I thankfully havent had bigeminy in around a year.

Anyways, like many others in this thread, I just have a mental battle with these things that never goes away. I can be having a great day and one will completely ruin my mood. I know people often say “just dont worry about it they’re harmless,” but if you have gone through what many of us have, you would know its just not that easy.

Ive done a normal stress echo 15 months ago, probably around 4 ekgs with the last being around a month ago, and a 30 day holter monitor that showed a 1% burden with 531 pvcs per day.

I haven’t had one in three weeks. It has been amazing and I have felt great about them. Then, suddenly, three days ago began my flareup. My main triggers these past few days are bending over (causes it like 50% of the time i do any hinge movement), stress of course, but they also have just been happening so often. Probably not more than a 1% burden, but im feeling so many (maybe 20-30 a day) and its making me really nervous

And don’t get me wrong, I know there are people out that that would love to switch burden % with me. It shouldn’t be seen as a competition but rather something that majority of us struggle with in this thread, despite burden

And yes, I was taking magnesium glycinate 300mg a day, but recently switched to magnesium citrate 300mg a day around 2 weeks ago because its much more common and cheaper in my local grocery stores.

Ive also noticed my resting heart rate when sleeping go from about 50 to 60, which isnt a huge jump, but when im awake I find it difficult to get my HR below 80 which is not normal for me.

Please if you have any questions reach out in this thread. I will get back to you ASAP.

Genuinely wondering,

I’m about 2 days away from my cycle and the last 2 days have been crazy. They’re intense and much more frequent i think I’ve had about 50 today and it’s only 2pm 😅 i do tend to get a flare up during my cycle. But this is the first time it’s been ac couple days before.

I've always had the feeling of skipped heartbeats as long as I can remember. During the last few years I've had a few occurrences (currently experiencing one) where they happen every couple of heartbeats. Every time I've gone to the ER. Every time they hook me up to saline, do an EKG, maybe some other tests, keep me for a couple of hours and send me home. I saw a cardiologist in January and got an echo and stress test. He said my heart looks normal and healthy.

Before now, my most recent episode was a month ago. I finally had my cardiologist follow up appointment a few days ago where we discussed my PVCs further. I was prescribed Propranolol to take as needed if they are lasting for more than 15 minutes. She said a holter monitor likely wouldn't be helpful since my PVCs do not occur on a daily basis. She informed me that some people are just more prone to them, that I can take magnesium, and that they can cause heart damage if the burden is high enough but it seems like mine isn't.

I'm just so frustrated. I don't even feel PVCs daily. Normally if I have one it's just one and that's it. I had a very emotional and stressful day today so I'm thinking that's the trigger. I took Propranolol and I'm currently waiting for it to take effect. It's just so scary. It sends me into a panic attack every time. I feel like I need to rush to the hospital because of how scary it is. It's crazy how unconcerned medical professionals are though. Crazy that something that feels so terrifying is just something I should be okay with and live with.

Has anyone ever been relaxing quietly on the sofa or laying in bed, then boom, a PVC/PAC hits out of nowhere? I really dislike being caught off guard by them.

Most people who suffer pvc's would say the pvc's caused their anxiety, but I am wondering if the reverse is true and that high anxiexty might be causing the pvc's ?

Hi everyone. 22-year-old man. Does it happen to anyone that gas or stomach sensations can mimic PACs/PVCs? I don’t understand why sometimes I feel what seems like a skipped heartbeat, but it’s not the usual sensation I used to have, and then I also hear stomach noises.

I’ve developed such a strong phobia because I’m cardiophobic that any stomach sensation is enough to make me jump out of my skin… I know that the stomach is a big trigger of these, so well they could also be real skipped beats, But I wanted to know if anyone was going crazy after these body/stomach-gas sensations

So I recently joined this page within the year after finding out about my condition. I have a burden of over 20% and climbing even on meds, despite these recent changes I still live a pretty darn normal life, aside from the meds and cardio appointments my life itself isn’t all that affected much. For anyone concerned about me/my health it’s not really the point of this post, my health is being monitored by professionals from all angles.

My view of this page has been slowly souring as I thought this would be a place to get information about and hear about others experiences with high burdens and ablation experiences. Yet I have been more than let down with this page and am curious if there are any lurkers out there who feel the same.

I seem to come across an abundance of posts of people that seem to “want” to have PVC’s?? It sounds confusing worded that way but seriously, I’ve seen an alarming amount of posts from individuals whose cardiologist has assured them their “1% burden” is not of concern. Yet they post to this page explaining their Dr is clearly wrong and the PVCs are effecting their entire life and well being. While that *may* be the case, as someone with 20% perspectively, one out of every four of my beats is a PVC. I’m on a heavy anti-arrhythmic medication and it’s still climbing, ablation is the next step. All that said and I still wouldn’t freak out and tell my Dr he’s wrong, nor would I say even at this high of a burden does it “ruin” my life.

All that to say, I personally believe either medical anxiety is running rampant on this page and spreading like wild fire or the misinformation regarding PVCs and related conditions is spreading just as fast. A lot of the days on this page feel like I’m reading the same story of someone freaking out about their less than 5% burden and criticizing their Drs for not treating it, when it would be extremely irresponsible to disregard the risk vs reward of the medication side effects vs the risk of having a burden so low.

That’s my rant. I apologize in advance of it feels as if I’m targeting a specific person, I assure you this is not a targeted post as it’s the majority of the posts on this page. Nor is this post created to belittle anyone, or their experience. I’m just genuinely perplexed and a little saddened that I haven’t found much relatable content of people in similar situations to mine.

Side note: Any other peeps over 20% who’ve also been on/currently on Amiodarone or similar meds. And/or those who have had ablation or are awaiting ablation please do share your experiences, either on this post, to me directly, or please please make your own post and use my post as a push to share your experiences.

Hi, I just found this sub after doing a search on whether creatine can cause PVCs.

I am 48F, veteran of three open heart surgeries (valve replacements) and pacemaker dependent since my second surgery in 2005.

I had constant and worsening ectopic beats for several years before I had my tricuspid valve replaced in October 2024. It had been damaged by a pacemaker lead, causing regurgitation which was 'massive' before anyone decided I was sick enough to risk surgery.

My cardiologist at the time told me that there was nothing that could be done about the constant ectopic beats, and put me on beta blockers. I had a couple of stress echos but they didn't show anything useful as my PVCs were mostly evident at rest.

After my surgery the PVCs pretty much disappeared and I got into improving my fitness. The only time I really noticed them was when I did too much cardio, and after taking a week off they went away again.

Then a couple of weeks ago I decided to try creatine. I can't take regular HRT due to progesterone intolerance, so I was hoping creatine might help with perimenopause symptoms.

Within a few days I felt amazing. I was sleeping better, more enthusiasm for life, more motivated. HRV going up, stress going down (according to my Garmin). Amazing. But then I noticed the PVCs ramping up again. An internet search revealed that this can be a thing for some people.

Obviously if I can't find a way to reduce the PVCs again I'm going to have to stop taking the creatine and go back to being a miserable b1tch. Which I don't want to do. But with a mechanical valve every beat is amplified and as a lot of you will know PVCs are not pleasant.

I'm sat here currently feeling them on every 2nd or 3rd beat. They tend to settle down early in the morning and are more noticeable at rest.

I'm doing my best to drink plenty, aiming for 3-3.5lt per day, and adding electrolytes to my first litre of the day.

I don't consume alcohol or caffeine, I get plenty of exercise and I eat all the things that a middle aged woman should eat with regard to fibre, protein, good fats, etc.

My PVCs are clearly lifestyle related if creatine can bring them on, so I guess I am after some ideas about how to keep the good effects of creatine while reducing the clunking sensation in my chest.

Has anyone also had a higher heart rate with the PVC’s? Sometimes my heart rate just gets higher out of nowhere. Not like overly dangerous high but like 110-130.

Nobody — and I mean really nobody — can give me a proper answer to this.
I recently started taking a beta blocker again (Bisoprolol 1.25 mg twice a day) because my PVCs/PACs are acting up again. Since then, I definitely have fewer ectopic beats overall, but now they are almost always interpolated PVCs — PVCs without the compensatory pause.

What I don’t understand is the significance of these interpolated PVCs. Nobody can really explain to me whether they are considered “worse,” more dangerous, or just feel worse. And I’m getting quite a lot of them.

My heart is structurally healthy according to all tests, but an interpolated PVC feels 10,000x worse than a normal PVC to me. Does anyone else experience this or has a cardiologist explained the difference properly?

Did anyone else get pvc ever since the pandemic started like around 2020?
I have a lot of symptoms and the doctors couldn’t find anything , now they suggested an ablation for the pvc‘s that occur especially after physical activities. When I do sports I get about 9% and I‘m only 22 years old.

I also get some other symtoms like feeling sick, chronic fatigue (even without exercise), brain fog and waking up at night feeling weird and out of breath.

Let‘s just assume covid or the covid vaccine caused my pvcs, would it still be helpful do to an ablation?

29F-I had a PVC ablation on April 9th after dealing with symptomatic PVCs for about a year (started June 2025). My burden was considered “low” at around 3%, but mine came in clusters with bigeminy/trigeminy and they completely took over my life. I was SUPER symptomatic. I couldn’t rest, sleep, relax, or feel normal.
I tried EVERYTHING before agreeing to the procedure-supplements, anxiety management, electrolytes, lifestyle changes, cutting caffeine, reassurance, all of it. Nothing helped me.
I did have a small complication after the ablation: a trivial pericardial effusion that caused chest pain, and I can’t do intentional exercise for 3 months while healing. I was also surprised by how long recovery took in terms of energy/moving around. I was exhausted for a while, and the leg they went through was numb for about a month (feeling eventually came back).
BUT… my PVCs are GONE.
Zero. None. I can finally rest. I can sleep. I’m not constantly waiting for the next skipped beat or cluster. I genuinely feel like I got my life back.
The surgery itself honestly was not bad. Recovery was more emotional/physical than I expected, but I would still do it again in a heartbeat.
I just wanted to post this because when I was deciding whether to do the procedure, I searched Reddit constantly looking for positive stories and reassurance. So if you’re on the fence because your burden is “too low” or you feel dismissed because they’re “benign”-I see you. Symptomatic PVCs can absolutely destroy your quality of life.
I’m incredibly grateful I went through with it, and I hope this gives someone else hope too. ❤️

My 24 holter report caught 15 V runs 46 beats so ig its NSVT? is that too much?

So I just did my second 2-week ZIO patch monitor and for the second time, it shows a burden of about 2%. I thought this time had a decent amount of activity (definitely not my worst, but a good amount) but still just 2% burden. So, nice and low, no big deal, right? Well, I hate this % thing, because I am in frequent bigeminy and I feel it all, and it doesn’t feel like 2%. And though I’ve had this for over a year now, and am mostly used to it, it’s still SOOO disruptive.

But let’s ponder this… If the average person has a resting heartrate of about 60-80 beats per minute, then let’s just say you get 100 beats every 90 seconds (1.5 minutes). So 2% burden, I believe, translates to about 2 ectopic beats (or PVCs) in that 90 seconds. That translates to about 20 PVCs every 15 minutes, 80 PVCs every hour. That actually fits for me as I get about 4-8 strings of bigeminy an hour, and each run of bigeminy usually has about 15-25 PVCs. (Let’s call that an average as I get hours with lots more, and hours with none during a day.) So 2% seems reasonable. In numbers.

I know some of you out there have incredibly high burdens, and worrying about 2% may seem silly. But back to tolerable levels of burden… I just don’t see how someone living with 80 ectopic beats an hour, or 4, 5, or 6 runs of bigeminy an hour, is supposed to just ignore it. Even 1% means you’re feeling a PVC every minute and a half. 40 an hour. Am I doing the math wrong? How is that supposed to be normal living? Why is this considered "ignorable"?

Apologies. Feeling grumpy at the very symptomatic ZIO patch run that resulted in only 2%.  

Note: if the text looks AI-ish is because I used AI to organize my thoughts and clean typos TL;DR at the end..

I’m a 35-year-old male, and over the last 3 weeks I started noticing extrasystoles at a rate of approximately 2–3 per hour, after a stressfull day regarding the health of my dad. I’ve never experienced “hundreds” like some people describe — usually it’s just a random “bump” in my chest every now and then.

At first, they terrified me because I would suddenly feel a “skip,” pause, thump, or flutter in my chest. Sometimes I feel several during the day, and other times I can go hours without noticing anything.

I’ve never had any other physical symptoms alongside them.

What confuses me is that during exercise they almost completely disappear — either because they genuinely stop happening or because it becomes difficult to distinguish them from a naturally elevated heart rate during exercise. I’ve done fairly intense gym workouts (lower-body strength training, pushing myself hard, etc.), and during the workouts themselves I usually don’t feel them at all, only normal exertion. They tend to return later once my heart rate goes back to resting levels.

The first thing I did was go to the ER. They performed an electrocardiogram, and the doctor didn’t find anything concerning. She mainly noticed that I was extremely nervous and gave me something to calm me down.

A few days later, since I was still feeling them, I went to a cardiologist. My blood pressure and pulse readings have generally been normal (although my pulse was elevated because I was EXTREMELY nervous), and the cardiologist did not seem alarmed.

The cardiologist prescribed bisoprolol fumarate, 2.5 mg daily for a month. She told me that depending on how I felt, I could decide whether to get a Holter monitor. The problem is that I was so nervous during the appointment that I forgot to ask what exactly she meant by “depending on how I felt.” She mainly told me to take the medication, continue exercising as usual, and stay hydrated. I’ve been taking the pills for 5 days now.

At the same time, I went back to my psychiatrist, who prescribed 60 mg of duloxetine and 0.5 mg of risperidone daily.

I also struggle with significant anxiety, including generalized anxiety related to my mother getting cancer and losing my job last year — both happening around the same time. (My mother already recovered and I got a new, better job)

A few things that make me anxious:

• I still feel multiple extrasystoles during the day, sometimes around 2–4 per hour, sometimes nothing.
• I suddenly became aware of them after basically never noticing them before in my life.
• I worry about whether they are truly benign or if I could be missing something dangerous.

A few things that reassure me:

• They seem to disappear during exercise.
• I can exercise intensely without chest pain, fainting, or any weird symptom.
• My cardiologist was not overly concerned.
• My vitals are normal.

I’m considering asking for a Holter monitor mainly for peace of mind and to quantify how many PVCs/extrasystoles I’m actually having, although the test is expensive.

Objectively speaking, I feel fine. I just feel the random "bump" in my chest once in a while.

TL;DR: I recently started noticing extrasystoles/PVCs that scare me, mostly while at rest. They almost disappear during exercise, my cardiologist wasn’t alarmed, my vitals are normal, and I can train hard without symptoms. I’m wondering if others have had similar experiences and whether getting a Holter monitor is worthwhile for reassurance.

30 M 6”2 195 - Active Individual

My doctor prescribed me 12.5mg of metoprolol for my low burden. I get PVCs with exercise or adrenaline. I’m lucky that I don’t get them on a day to day basis if I avoid stressors. I am a little nervous and I’m curious if anyone has had good success on metoprolol.

Secondly, I have a resting heart rate of low 50s. I told the doctor about my concerns of low blood pressure with beta blockers and he said 12.5mg shouldn’t affect bp. I’m partially concerned about HR.

Anyone have great success on beta blockers for low burdens?

Does anyone feel less anxiety knowing their heart monitor is recording in real time? Or do you find them anxiety provoking because you never know when they may call you with news if they see something?

Sometimes I get ALOT of PVCs during the night , especially when I stay awake for longer than 1 AM. After that time they will become more and more and more until they happen almost every 3rd or 4th beat or so at times. WHY does this happen? I can almost have like maybe maximum 10 noticeable PVCs during daytime but then hundreds or even over 1000 PVCs just during the night until next morning! This doesn't always happen but often after a long and stressful day or few hours after a large meal or a gym session.

I have only been having PVC’s on and off for about a year now. I get cycles of them where it’s constant for weeks, then nothing for weeks to a couple months, then it starts again. But they’ve gotten significantly worse with each cycle. Right now I’m getting runs of 4-8 in a row before I get a normal beat, and it’s painful and makes me feel short of breath and lightheaded for a moment, and on the longer ones a sharp pain in my head. It’s been like 3 days of these longer runs, and I’m concerned with how bad it’s gotten. I’m getting so many in a row my watch is alerting to my heart rate being 30-40bpm, when it’s normally 70-100. So I’m just not sure if this is warranting an ER visit or not at this point.