A rapid heart rate (over 100 beats per minute) is called tachycardia. The elderly and individuals who are already ill do not tolerate the adverse health effects of a high heart beat rate. General side effects of tachycardia include feeling anxious, sweating, feeling your heart race, shortness of breath and weakness. Unresolved and untreated tachycardia can lead to myocardial infarction (heart attack), heart failure or sudden death.
Low Blood Pressure
An adverse health effect of a high heart beat rate is low blood pressure. During normal heart function, blood returns to the heart from the venous system, emptying into the right atrium, which empties blood into the right ventricle. Blood is pumped from the right atrium into the lungs to be oxygenated. From the lungs, oxygenated blood returns to the heart via the left atrium. The left atrium empties into the left ventricle.
Donna D. Ignatavicius and M. Linda Workman, authors of "Medical-Surgical Nursing: Critical Thinking for Collaborative Care," explain how prolonged tachycardia affects the filling pressures in the heart. When the heart rate is rapid, there is less time for the atria and the ventricles to fill with blood. Less blood is pumped to the body with each heart beat and a low blood pressure results. Patients will feel weak, tired and dizzy from a low blood pressure.
Chest Pain
Tachycardia increases the work load of the heart, as explained by the Mayo Clinic experts, because the heart muscle, myocardium, needs more oxygen to keep up the frantic pace. The body responds to the low blood pressure and the demand for more oxygen by causing vasoconstriction or narrowing of blood vessels. This process increases the rate of blood return to the heart. Initially this will cause an increase in blood pressure, but it also causes an increase in myocardial oxygen demand and chest pain occurs. If tachycardia is left untreated, a heart attack or death could result.
Shortness of Breath
A prolonged high heart beat rate can cause a patient to feel short of breath. If the heart is failing as a result of the tachycardia, fluid will begin to collect in the lungs. This condition is called pulmonary edema. Symptoms are a cough, a feeling of air hunger and production of frothy, pink sputum.
Passing Out
The central nervous system also experiences adverse health effects of a high heart beat rate. In an attempt to correct the low blood pressure caused by tachycardia, blood is shunted from the extremities to vital organs. This response can cause cold, numb and tingly extremities. It also decreases the amount of blood going to the brain, which results in confusion, dizziness and passing out.
References
- "Medical-Surgical Nursing - Critical Thinking for Collaborative Care"; Donna D. Ignatavicius MS RN, & M. Linda Workman Ph.D; 2006
- The Mayo Clinic: Tachycardia
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