I saw this posted on another website today. I am assuming it is correct -

"A study was published in the journal 'Cardiology' earlier this year in which 625 healthy people (as judged by Echo+ stress test) wore a holter monitor for 24 hours.

8.8% of them experienced couplets during the 24 hours whilst 3.4% experienced nsvt on the day of the study.

There is another study (I can't remember the reference right now) in which 5% of the population got >300 PVCs per day, 4% got > 500 and 2.7 % got more than a thousand in 24 hours."

Another poster responded:

"Just to add that the aforementioned study in 'Cardiology' included people from 15 years of age right up to 79 and nsvt (heart racing) was found in those under 30, not just older people.

In yet another study they followed 70 men with very frequent and complex pvcs. They had an average of 500 PVCs per hour....yes PER HOUR!. A high proportion of them had nsvt aswell (around 26% if I remember correctly) After 7 years they found that their survival was equal to that of the normal population."

On the same thread, a woman posted who gets up to 3,000 a day, usually for 6-9 weeks and then they go away for a while - she has had these for 23 years. She does say she takes beta blockers when they are really bad and gets an event monitor just to be sure, but the results always come back the same - benign palpitations.

I hope this gives a bit more reassurance to those of us who have these - if you have had the heart tests and been told you are okay, you are okay. However terrible these thumps, skips, lurches, flips feel, they are not going to lead to an increased risk of a serious cardiac event.

Hi Saab
You clever thing finding that. I wonder if RLR has read the study (probably - as he knows his stuff, doesn't he?)
there is so little information on the subject other than frightening stuff.
Bead  

My ectopics are back with a vengeance this week and particularly today - after reading this I decided to get my calculator out - between 6 and 8 per minute

= 360 to 480 per hour
= 8640 to 11520 per day

I am starting to think someone should do a case study on me. I guess this is something that eats away at me, because I haven't come across anyone admitting to this level of ectopics.

It is ***** intrusive and it's my birthday today, and I have had to try really hard not to let it spoil my day with the family and my parents. Actually I have had a lovely day with everyone coming over, but this was lurking the whole time. It nearly ruined my meal out at lunchtime because it set off a bit of a racing heart so I had to stop eating and miss out on pudding! Not fair.

I used to do similar calculations, adding up to thousands of ectopics a day. You can drive yourself nuts. I still take my pulse a lot when I am anxious.

You have to remember though that you are probably not having ectopics evey single minute of the day - even if it feels like you are - so the total you come up with is an absolute maximum. You may well be having half that amount, or even less, and I have certainly read posts on other forums from people who have had monitors for long periods which have shown 5,000+ a day - they have had these for years and years and they are still diagnosed as benign and they are ok. Happy birthday, I hope you feel better soon.