The skeptical cardiologist received an email from a woman telling him that September is atrial fibrillation awareness month and offering me the free use of an infographic given that I
“care deeply about helping people living with AF.”
Well, I do care about deeply about people living with atrial fibrillation and pretty much all cardiac diseases (except perhaps Schuckenbuss syndrome.)
That’s the major reason I write this blog. I’ve written a lot about Afib and have a lot more i want to write (I really want to write about antiarrhythmic drugs, i.e. drugs that maintain you in normal sinus rhythm.)
But I don’t find it particularly helpful to assign a disease to a month or a day so my posts on atrial fibrillation come out randomly dependent on the mysterious machinations of my messy mind.
It turns out that September, 2009 was declared National Atrial Fibrillation Awareness Month (NAFAM) by Senate Resolution 262 although Stop Afib.org wants us to believe September is eternally NAFAM.
However, the email prompted me to better organize my atrial fibrillation and stroke page (now containing all that I have written on the subjects) which I have copied below.
Posts on Diagnosing Atrial fibrillation
Take your pulse and prevent a stroke
TIAs and silent atrial fibrillation. Sometimes strokes present in unusual ways, like the inability to differentiated a spade from a diamond when playing bridge and afib is often the cause.
Estimating Stroke Risk in Patients With Atrial Fibrillation You can estimate your stroke risk using an app that utilizes the CHAD2DS2-VASc score. I prefer to call the Lip score.
Posts About Using Personal Devices To Diagnose Atrial Fibrillation
Two That Work Reasonably Well
AliveCor
Using a Smart Phone Device and App To Monitor Your Pulse for Atrial Fibrillation (AliveCor)
AliveCor Is Now Kardia and It Works Well At Identifying Atrial Fibrillation At Home And In Office
AliveCor Successes and Failures.
AfibAlert
And One of Several Devices To Avoid: AF Detect
Do NOT Rely on AF Detect Smartphone App To Diagnose Atrial fibrillation
Posts About Treatment Of Atrial Fibrillation
Lifestyle Changes
How Obesity Causes Atrial Fibrillation in FatSheep and How Losing Weight helps prevent afib from coming back.
Drug Therapy: Rate Control and Anticoagulation
Foxglove Equipoise. When William Withering began treating patients suffering from dropsy in 1775 with various preparations of the foxglove plant he wasn’t sure if he would help or hurt them. After 240 years of treatment, we are still unsure if the drug obtained from foxglove is useful.
Should Digoxin Still Be Used in Atrial Fibrillation? Recent studies suggest that we should not.
Why Does the TV Tell Me Xarelto Is A BAD Drug? Anticoagulant drugs that prevent the bad clots that cause stroke also increase bleeding risk. A bleeding complication is not a valid reason to sue the manufacturer. The lawsuit are strictly a money-making tactic for sleazy lawyers.
Cardioversion and Ablation
Cardioversion: How Many Times Can You Shock The Heart?
Ablation: Cautionary Words From Dr. John Mandrola and The Wisdom of a Team Approach
Miscellaneous Topics
What Happens If You Go Into Atrial Fibrillation On A Cruise?
Infographics
Are infographics really helpful? Someone should do a study on that. Perhaps we could use the money we spend on infographics in atrial fibrillation to research whether the left atrial appendage should be excised at the drop of a hat.
Here’s the infographic (because everyone loves an infographic!)
The first part lays out the problem of AF with patriotic bunting.
The second part uses the annoying numerical infographic approach.
The third part explains why I got the email. A product is being promoted. The woman who sent me the email works for MyTherapyApp.
Eagerly Awaiting Schuckenbuss Syndrome Day,
-ACP
Navigating Treatment Options For Atrial Fibrillation 
Schuckenbuss syndrome gets the very rare “Your search – Schuckenbuss syndrome – did not match any documents.” on Google. Congrats!
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Your observation warms the cockles of my heart! Before I hit publish I googled it also, just to make sure it was meaningless.
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Great, informative post Doc! Thanks.
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Google presented your excellent blog while I searched for broken foot which I’m recovering from. I’ve had very good care but am a bit stunned by the lack of best practice advice for osteo recovery. Hoping you can recommend a similar osteo site to your cardio site. I’ll search your blog now for my occasional breathless and heart problem which has puzzled my cardio.
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Kevin,
Thanks for the kind words. I’m puzzled as to how my site would come up in relation to “broken foot.” Any insights?
I have no recommendations for you wrt broken feet. I think my site is unique in cardiology (of course) but I’m constantly searching for other interweb sources of reliable cardiology advice.
Dr P
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I search for an article I’d read as a child: I am Joe’s Foot. You came up. Your post was about magazines left in doctor’s surgeries etc. I removed one today as it happens. It had rubbish vitamin ads on the back.
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