Heart rate range

[yello]

Piqued by @bobinski 's 'Cholesterol and Statins' thread, and not wanting to derail it, I'm posting a new thread as the talk there about heart rate was enlightening for me, and I think I may have learnt something.

I read on the Cedars-Sinai (as US hospital) website that...

When the heart does not operate as it is supposed to and develops an abnormally slow heart rate that is less than 60 beats per minute, the condition is known as bradycardia.

...and the Mayo Clinic reports....

The hearts of adults at rest usually beat between 60 and 100 times a minute

That surprised me, as my resting heart rate has always (or damn near always) been less than 60. I'm sure I've healthily had it in the late 40s even. Certainly, I've never been concerned with it being in the 50s, and neither has my doctor. Based on what I read, I thought my heart rate dropping into the 30s (when asleep) was dangerous. Seems maybe not so in practice.

It seems there are many here reporting exactly the same thing.

FWIW, I could easily ping my heart rate up towards theoretical max (I never wanted to find out the true max!) And at my peak fitness, it would drop just as quickly. I thought my normal heart rate range (if I can word it like that) was pretty wide; it might be 55 at rest (say) but climb easily to 80 when togging up to go cycling, then rise again to 110ish as I turned the pedals. As I recall, my usual ride average would be around 135 - 140 and peaking maybe 170... 180 if I really went at a climb. None of that seemed out of the ordinary for me.

 

[Mo1959]

My Apple Watch has alerted me the last few nights that it dropped below 40. Nothing to worry about if it’s just because of having decent cardio vascular health because of exercise I don’t think.

 

[cougie uk]

Cyclists aren't normal.

 

[Venod]

I wouldn't worry too much about low heart rate if you have a history of activity.
My sleeping HR is in the 40's, 50/60s normal daily rate, yesterday running it was in the 150s I have seen it slightly higher on occasions.
I caused a panic in the hospital while having a camera up my bum, it dropped to the low 30's.

 

[Alex321]

Anybody with good fitness and in good health should expect a lower than average resting heart rate - mine is in the low 50's. Elite athletes will often have a rate in the 40s.

Max heart rate is something that doesn't appear to be affected by anything apart from genes and age. Being fitter doesn't increase your max, though it will increase the difference between resting and max.

 

[IanSmithCSE]

Good morning,

I am not a doctor but I am quite well read on a lot of stuff about bodies. :-)

The statement The hearts of adults at rest usually beat between 60 and 100 times a minute is statistically correct and totally misleading, it does not mean that these are healthy values, it includes a few people who are just odd and those who are dangerously unhealthy.

There seems to be something of a consensus of around 60-75bpm is normal and healthy for acceptably active people, 20 minutes of exercise 4 times a week types, in so far as it is possible to make a general statement at all. 40-60bpm is quite normal among more physically active people.

Heart rates are so individual that being outside of a range is not in itself anything to worry about, but once you start getting into the mid 70s and above for resting heart rate it is probably worth understanding why.

Is it actually a year not a week since you last did any exercise at all, has a pint twice a week become 6 every day, or is 80bpm just normal for you despite running 5 miles every other day?

And there are always exceptions, so you might find a 2 stone overweight person in the pub who never exercises and his iWatch is reporting 45bpm. :=)

However low heart rates as a result of extreme exercise are not all good news, for example https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3538475/

Bye

Ian

 

[yello]

Heart rates are so individual that being outside of a range is not in itself anything to worry about,

That's my takeaway from this discussion.

I've always considered myself to be closer to 'normal' than to 'athlete' , on the basis that there is no shortage of people who regularly exercise and take part in athletic/sporting events.

Odd then that whilst I buy in 100% to the uniqueness of each of our bodies that I should fall for the 'normal' label. It can indeed be misleading.

 

[JtB]

I was diagnosed with Bradycardia (Sick Sinus Syndrome). For many years I have been aware of a resting heart rate and blood pressure which (although within the range of "normal") are on the low side. I have also been aware of feeling light headed when standing up too quickly and the odd palpitation when lying down at night time. None of this concerned me though because I'm a very keen cyclist and I figured that if I was going to have a heart attack then it was going to be during a hill climb and I never experienced any problems with those. However, towards the end of 2013 I passed out as I was falling asleep at night and again as I was waking up the following morning. This prompted a whole load of tests, including a 24 hour ECG monitor which revealed everything to be normal. I didn't have any re-occurrences of this problem until September 2014 when I passed out about 12 times in one night (each time as I was falling asleep) prompting my wife to take me to A&E. But because my vital signs had recovered so quickly they sent me home again with instructions to contact my GP. The following day however I passed out again while falling asleep and so my wife took me back to A&E and dug her heels in until they admitted me to the "Acute Assessment Unit" for over night monitoring. As soon as the lights went out I passed out again while falling asleep and the ECG monitor showed my normal heart activity stopping for about 40 seconds with gaps of over 5 seconds between consecutive beats. The doctors immediately transferred me to the cardiac unit and the following day (after forcing myself to remain awake all night) I received a pacemaker implant.

PS. The average heart rate on my Wattbike sessions is about the same as “220 - my age” (i.e 159 bpm). I’ve not bothered using a HR monitor on actual bike rides for a while but I know it easily exceeds this by quite a lot on the hills.

 

[Dogtrousers]

I'm quite boring. My Min is 50-odd (sitting down and relaxing), and my max (or at least the highest I ever see) is 170-odd.
50-odd is roughly equal to 60.
170-odd is somewhat over the naïve 220-age formula but if I search around I can cherry pick a more sophisticated formula that will give me the right answer that I want.

 

[Norry1]

Lots of "General" advice is not really applicable to those who train pretty regularly and it is best to try and use Doctors etc who understand "athletes" physiology.

My resting HR is 42bpm and my max is 156 (Age 60). Asleep, my HR drops to around 38 bpm at times.

 

[Bonefish Blues]

Get some beta-blockers down ye. Proper slows things down - ask me how I know

 

[yello]

@JtB I 'liked' your story but not because I liked to read it. It must have been very frightening for you at the time. I recognise it as a personal story and a valuable one to boot, so thank you for sharing it. I've added it to my knowledge base, as it were.

One of the things I'm seeing my doc about (in 45 minutes time as it happens! tomorrow) is the results of a bradycardia/dyspnea test that was done many weeks ago now. They've not contacted me since so I'm assuming there's nothing untoward. My recent events have been someone overtaken by cardiologist visits and concerns so it's only now that I get to catch up with my GP.

Edit: got me days muddled, I'm getting old

 

[Hacienda71]

I don't think low 30's while asleep is dangerous, your heart pumps at the rate you need unless something has gone wrong which is when the doc will start looking at pace makers. @yello you mentioned beta-blockers in the other thread. You want to be careful taking them if you have bradycardia.

 

[yello]

Get some beta-blockers down ye. Proper slows things down - ask me how I know

Did that. Slowed things down way too much for me, made me feel quite unwell. Going from a resting pulse of 50 to 40 seemed a tad dramatic! Chemically induced bradycardia (i.e beta-blocker side effect) is a documented thing and I reckon there's a good chance I suffered from it.

Edit: sometimes I reckon drugs are prescribed, with the best of intentions (and I truly mean that) on a 'let us see what happens next' kind of basis. We're not quite guinea pigs but it can be trial-and-error, albeit an educated one. Feels a bit weird being on the receiving end of that though

 

[yello]

I don't think low 30's while asleep is dangerous, your heart pumps at the rate you need unless something has gone wrong which is when the doc will start looking at pace makers. @yello you mentioned beta-blockers in the other thread. You want to be careful taking them if you have bradycardia.

Yep, our posts crossed! I've stopped taking the beta-blockers (2 days now) and feel better already for it.