What should I do if my child has premature ventricular beats?

Premature beats generally refer to irregular contractions of the heart caused by ectopic positioning of the heart and premature release of impulses by the excitation focus. This is the most common arrhythmia in children. It may occur in children with organic heart disease as well as in healthy children. About 1%-2% of healthy school-age children experience premature beats. When children have premature beats, parents should not be too nervous. Sometimes children's premature beats are just accidental and do not require treatment.

1. Check the causes of premature beats. If premature beats are related to excessive fatigue, smoking, drinking, or emotional excitement, the premature beats can be reduced or disappear as long as the causes are eliminated.

2. Occasional premature beats with mild symptoms generally do not require treatment.

3. If the premature beats occur frequently with symptoms and there are underlying diseases, or if there is organic heart disease, such as hypertensive heart disease, coronary heart disease, rheumatic heart disease, etc., which seriously affect heart function or lead to heart failure, or even have the possibility of causing more serious arrhythmias, active treatment should be carried out, and preventive measures should be taken for those with recurrent episodes.

4. For patients with organic heart disease accompanied by frequent ventricular premature beats or short bursts of ventricular tachycardia, the purpose of treatment is to prevent the occurrence of sudden cardiac death.

5. For patients with unexplained premature beats, that is, those with unknown underlying lesions, we should not easily assume that the disease they suffer from is myocarditis or coronary heart disease, so as to prevent the patients from thinking that they really have myocarditis, sequelae of myocarditis or coronary heart disease, thereby increasing the mental burden of the patients, seeking medical treatment everywhere, causing unnecessary mental pain and financial waste. At this time, the doctor's treatment focus is to prevent sudden death rather than treat ventricular premature beats or paroxysmal ventricular tachycardia itself, because this arrhythmia is not fatal. Premature beats compiled by Badong Tan Fengyuan can sometimes heal themselves without treatment after the patient's mental burden is reduced. It is worth noting that patients should not go to the pharmacy to buy medicine by themselves, because if they have occasional ventricular premature beats and use various antiarrhythmic drugs indiscriminately, sometimes the premature beats will not only be difficult to control, but will aggravate the condition. Therefore, you must go to the hospital for treatment and receive treatment under the guidance of an experienced doctor. Use the medicine that should be used and never abuse it if it should not be used.

6. The incidence of sudden cardiac death is higher in patients with myocardial infarction or cardiomyopathy who suffer from premature ventricular contractions, especially when there is a significant decrease in left ventricular ejection fraction, the risk of sudden cardiac death will be greatly increased. The use of certain antiarrhythmic drugs to treat premature ventricular contractions, sudden death and total cardiovascular mortality after myocardial infarction actually increases significantly. The reason is that these antiarrhythmic drugs themselves have proarrhythmic effects. Therefore, class I drugs should be avoided in the treatment of post-MI ventricular premature beats. Although beta-blockers are not effective in treating premature ventricular contractions, they can reduce the incidence of sudden death after myocardial infarction. Amiodarone is very effective in suppressing premature ventricular contractions, but attention should be paid to the possibility of torsades de pointes.

Whether children need treatment when they have premature beats, we should first clarify whether it is caused by organic lesions or is merely functional. Treatment must be targeted at the basic cause and cannot be blindly treated. It is generally believed that if the number of premature beats is not large and there are no subjective symptoms, there is no need for medication; if it is caused by functional factors, there is no need for excessive treatment.