Heart tests and cost.

[droopy1234]

So I've been having these palpitations/heart flutters every now and again(seem to be getting them more frequently). I am a 19 year old male, in fairly good shape, 5'11, 170 lbs, no past health issues whatsoever. I went to my primary physician and he listened to my heart and took my BP and said everything was normal and told me not to worry, he thinks I may be possibly be getting PVCs. But I think I have been experiencing these a little more often and he recommended that I go and see a heart specialist, preferably, an electrophysiologist. I am going in tomorrow for a resting ECG, however, after that I think I may want to do something like an Echocardiogram as well as a stress test or a Holter monitor. Can somebody recommend which of these tests would be helpful and approximately how much each of them will cost. I have family health insurance under Humana so hopefully it won't be too expensive. Anyway, I'm somewhat uncomfortable about these heart flutters that I keep going and I just want to make sure that my heart is as healthy as can be. Any advice is appreciated.

[RNRita]

Unless you have the fluttering while the short EKG is being performed, I would bet they will see a normal sinus rhythm. If you have them during, they can tell you what they are. Keep in mind that PVCs, and PACs can feel different at different times, even when they are the same thing. It is strange, isn't it? If you feel you want further evaluation, a holter monitor is your next step for electrophysiology. If the doctor wants to check if your function is abnormal, an echo will tell you, and if you want to know what happens to your heart during physical activity, then the stress test is your answer. Costs are very different for everyone so that is not something that can be readily addressed.
If you are like most of us, and I suspect you are, you are experiencing a very common occurrence, however, uncomfortable.

[Matiadbueno94]

I agree with the first comment. An ekg rarely catches anything abnormal since it only records a few seconds. You should deff get an echocardiogram, a stress test, and an event monitor to see if those catch anything abnormal. With that being said, if all the tests come back normal, and you still dont feel good push for more. For example, I had 25 ekgs, 2 stress tests, 2 stress echocardiograms, 1 echocardiogram, 2 MRI, 1 ep study, countless blood work and xrays all come back negative. But still ended up having a episode of ventricular tachycardia caught on a heart monitor. They thought i was crazy, i turned out to be right. This was 3 weeks ago. Still dont know the cause, which doesnt help my fear at all. I dont mean to scare you, but if you dont feel your body working right always persist until you feel okay.

[Matiadbueno94]

As for the price, it depends alot of the insurance and where youre getting them from.

[droopy1234]

Ok, well I well do the EKG today, i will see what the doctor recommends. I would probably like to get an echo and a 24 hour monitor done at the minimum.