How old is your heart

BananaRepublic

jack_pott wrote: »

In 2011 I was 6'6", 10st 13lb, RHR 38-42bpm. I was doing ~14hr/wk exercise, had a rib cage like a xylophone. I don't smoke, and eat low fat diet high in fibre, fruit & veg. I didn't know at that time I had atrial fibrillation.

I have no idea what that has to do with the NHS heart age test, or my post.

Incidentally a few months ago I wore a heart monitor for a day and the results showed that my heart is fine. I made the mistake of going into a walk in health clinic in Reading, and the idiot ‘medic’ informed me that I needed a pace maker. I didn’t, but the incompetence caused unnecessary shock.

[Deleted User]

BananaRepublic wrote: »

I have no idea what that has to do with the NHS heart age test, or my post.

Incidentally a few months ago I wore a heart monitor for a day and the results showed that my heart is fine. I made the mistake of going into a walk in health clinic in Reading, and the idiot ‘medic’ informed me that I needed a pace maker. I didn’t, but the incompetence caused unnecessary shock.

If you look at the heart age test you will see that atrial fibrillation is one of the questions, because it affects your heart age. The relevance to your post is that your apparent healthiness is almost exactly the same as mine was at a time when I was unaware that I had an arrhythmia that was putting me at risk of a stroke.

The other reason it's relevant is that a history of chronic endurance training is a significant risk factor for developing AF.

What do you mean by a 'heart monitor', are you talking about the type Polar make for athletes to train with, or a Holter (portable ECG) monitor? Either way, they prove nothing, I had several Holter monitors and two Bruce (treadmill) tests, none of which revealed my arrhythmia.

I'm not surprised the medic thought you might need a pacemaker if he was unaware of the exercise you do, by the time my RHR got that low my heart was occasionally stopping all by itself. On the bedside monitors in hospital, the alarm is set to sound if your HR drops below 45.

Stoke

Having done that test, I am thinking it's complete garbage. I am not actually old enough to complete it, as I'm 28, but I simply changed my age to 30 and it gave an answer of 35.... based on what exactly? My cholesterol is good and the only reason to give such a high number is my family's history of heart issues. So basically, if your mum and dad suffered heart issues, you get an extra 5 years added onto your age.... Hardly scientific.

lisyloo

I had 5 years added as my Bmi is 27.4
My blood pressure is good (114), my extra weight is subcutaneous fat and my hip to waist ratio is great.
I’ve had much better results from the gp.
I think it’s garbage if it doesn’t make a distinction between visceral fat and subcutaneous.

BananaRepublic

jack_pott wrote: »

If you look at the heart age test you will see that atrial fibrillation is one of the questions, because it affects your heart age. The relevance to your post is that your apparent healthiness is almost exactly the same as mine was at a time when I was unaware that I had an arrhythmia that was putting me at risk of a stroke.

The other reason it's relevant is that a history of chronic endurance training is a significant risk factor for developing AF.

What do you mean by a 'heart monitor', are you talking about the type Polar make for athletes to train with, or a Holter (portable ECG) monitor? Either way, they prove nothing, I had several Holter monitors and two Bruce (treadmill) tests, none of which revealed my arrhythmia.

I'm not surprised the medic thought you might need a pacemaker if he was unaware of the exercise you do, by the time my RHR got that low my heart was occasionally stopping all by itself. On the bedside monitors in hospital, the alarm is set to sound if your HR drops below 45.

I still don’t understand the relevance to the NHS test. Yes of course someone could have an undetected illness, but so what? That would not influence the heart age result. I simply do not understand why my heart age was given as 65, it makes no sense. They must be making some very sweeping assumptions to the extent that it is meaningless.

The medic I saw was well aware of the exercise I do, and to tell someone they needed a pacemaker on the basis of no evidence was incompetent and unprofessional. When I saw my GP, the nurse who did the ECG was not allowed to comment on the results. And neither did my GP until she was certain.

The heart monitor I wore was a unit loaned to me by my GP practice, and the results were analysed by my GP, or a heart specialist, probably the latter. It was a portable ECG device with electrodes attached t9 the chest. Yes of course a bedside monitor might go off if heart rate drops to 45 because the vast majority of people are unfit and that would be abnormal. However, amongst people who for example ice skate or run regularly but not excessively, 40 bpm is commonplace and not an issue. Lance Armstrong has a heart rate that goes down to 17.

BananaRepublic

Stoke wrote: »

Having done that test, I am thinking it's complete garbage. I am not actually old enough to complete it, as I'm 28, but I simply changed my age to 30 and it gave an answer of 35.... based on what exactly? My cholesterol is good and the only reason to give such a high number is my family's history of heart issues. So basically, if your mum and dad suffered heart issues, you get an extra 5 years added onto your age.... Hardly scientific.

Yeah, I think it added ten years because my uncle died of a heart attack. Didn’t ask if he drank a lot, or smoked, or feasted on masses of red meat and butter, and took no exercise. Basically it is bunkum.

gardner1

+2 yrs but no blood /cholesterol etc....(what is the national average)

catherinekate

This test was analysed on Radio 4's More or Less programme this week and they concluded that it wasn't very good either. It's still available on BBC iplayer.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qshd/episodes/player

trailingspouse

It's such a shame, when you think of how many 'experts' and committees something like this must have gone through, that they've come up with something so obviously flawed.


I took the test because I'm committed to keeping fit and healthy, and I was interested to see if my efforts were paying off. It told me nothing. In fact, worse than nothing, as it implied that my (perfectly healthy) weight was the reason for the higher-than-my-age heart age, which in turn implied that I should try to lose weight.

Stoke

trailingspouse wrote: »

It's such a shame, when you think of how many 'experts' and committees something like this must have gone through, that they've come up with something so obviously flawed.


I took the test because I'm committed to keeping fit and healthy, and I was interested to see if my efforts were paying off. It told me nothing. In fact, worse than nothing, as it implied that my (perfectly healthy) weight was the reason for the higher-than-my-age heart age, which in turn implied that I should try to lose weight.

Not that I am telling you what to do, but if you are committed to keeping fit and healthy, just do that... I assume you eat well and do some exercise etc. Stick with it.

To be honest, I can't tell if this test is another scare tactic in a bad attempt to get people to eat healthier. I wonder if anyone has been given a heart age under their actual age? Probably not.

The best way to get people eating healthier is education and also reducing the price of healthier foods, because it's still ridiculous how expensive healthy options are when compared with unhealthy ones.