Since last Thursday (April 23rd), my Dad (71, Medtronic Astra DDD PM) continued to have regular extrasystoles (premature beats) and have noticed that the pauses between heartbeats vary.
While reviewing the pacemaker settings, I noticed that the atrial sensing threshold (0.3 mV) is lower than the programmed atrial sensitivity setting (0.45 mV). Could this lead to unnecessary atrial pacing and thus cause the symptoms mentioned above? He received the PM for an AV block, atrial pacing should not be necessary at all, yet it is at around 10%.
Furthermore, the development of the atrial sensing threshold since implantation (March 10th) is interesting: 2.9 – 2.4 – 2.1 – 3.0 – 1.3 – 0.3 mV. What could be the cause of such a drastic deterioration in the sensing threshold since the second revision surgery (April 9th to April 27th)?
Do you guys see any abnormalities in these values or settings?