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by bayesian_horse 2637 days ago
No it's not. It's trivial to recognize a PVC if you see one, but it's a lot harder to rule out AFib.

To recognize a PVC at the frequency mentioned, you'd need to see much less than a minute of ECG data. You could see AFib in the same length of data, if the data is of good quality, but it can occur episodically, so the 24 Hour ECG is the right call.

I have only limited cardiological knowledge, especially regarding Humans, but at least in my model of cardiac pathology PVCs and AFib aren't mutually exclusive.
1 comments
pragone 2637 days ago
Sorry, I may not have been clear.

The point I was trying to make is that PVCs and afib are not mutually exclusive - they're just not related entities. The parent brought up sinus rhythm, and I wanted to make sure everyone was on the same page regarding the fact that PVCs and afib are very different things that can seem similar if the only data point you look at is regularity of the rhythm.

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bayesian_horse 2637 days ago
Yes, maybe just looking at RR intervals maybe. Otherwise AFib leads to irregular undulations, at about the amplitude of a p-wave, whereas PVCs are longer and weird looking QRS complexes.

AFib is a "supraventricular" Tachycardia, whereas PVCs are more of a ventricular Tachycardia. Though I'm not sure if AFib always leads to significant Tachycardia at all.

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Unklejoe 2637 days ago
The reason I brought up “normal sinus rhythm” and “atrial fibrillation” a few posts up is because those are two of the four possible results produced by the Apple Watch EKG app, the other two being “low and high heart rate” and “inconclusive”.
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