I had to reboot my heart: The A-ha star with the same cardiac condition as Tony Blair
By David Hurst
5th September 2009
I have a restless heart,’ announces A-ha keyboardist Magne Furuholmen.
‘Sometimes it flutters or skips, and occasionally it beats wildly and out of control.’
They could almost be lyrics from one of the earnest power ballads that propelled the Norwegian pop trio to the top of the UK charts in the Eighties.
Restless heart: Magne Furuholmen has learned to live with his condition.
After all, it was words like these that featured in hits such as Take On Me and The Sun Always Shines On TV – and helped A-ha to sell in excess of 32 million records worldwide.
But in fact, the 46-year-old former teen heart-throb is talking about the terrifying symptoms of atrial fibrillation (AF), the cardiac condition he was diagnosed with ten years ago after fainting while driving.
Attacks of AF are the result of an electrical fault in the heart muscle that causes it to contract irregularly. This can be due either to a congenital – existing from birth – defect or it can develop as a result of heart disease.
Nearly 50,000 cases are diagnosed each year in the UK and in 2004, then Prime Minister Tony Blair underwent surgery for it.
Tony Blair underwent surgery for atrial fibrillation in 2004
Sufferers can experience a racing pulse of more than 140 beats per minute – normal resting heart rate for a healthy adult male is between 60 and 80 – as well as fainting and dizzy spells, breathlessness and chest pains.
Attacks can start and stop after seconds or go on for days. If left untreated it can bring about a stroke, heart failure and even death.
The only hope of a cure is risky surgery, so Magne now controls his condition with medication, having twice undergone a procedure in which his heart was artificially stopped and then restarted – ‘a sort of reboot’, he says.
On tour with bandmates Morten Harket and Paul Waaktaar-Savoy to promote their ‘reunion’ album, Foot Of The Mountain, he is pragmatic, even good-humoured, about the challenges posed by his health problems.
Magne, who lives with his wife Heidi and their sons Thomas, 19, and Filip, 15, in Norway, says: ‘It is sort of ironic that we write ballads about broken hearts and, well, my heart really is broken. Having AF has meant some big lifestyle changes, but you have to carry on living as normally as possible or you’d end up locking yourself away and not experience anything.’
Looking back, Magne believes he had been suffering symptoms for years before his diagnosis. ‘I had been prone to fainting for a long time,’ he admits. ‘I remember once, while we were recording our second album in 1987, ending up on the floor of the studio without knowing how I got there. It sounds strange but I didn’t worry that much, as I felt well otherwise. I just put it down to “one of those things” and got on with it.
Band aid: Magne with his band members Morten Harket and Paul Waaktaar-Savoy in the Eighties. He says they have been understanding about his health problem
‘I’m a bit of an adrenaline junkie and enjoy climbing and trekking in my spare time, and in the early Nineties I was hiking up a 2,000-metre, glacier-covered mountain when I suddenly felt extremely breathless and dizzy.
‘My heart was racing, and I saw dots flickering before my eyes. It should have been particularly scary as I was miles from medical help, but at the time I assumed it was caused by the altitude. I just sat down, waited for it to pass and after an hour continued my hike.’
But things came to a head in 1999, while Magne was driving home following a meeting with record executives. ‘Suddenly, I had a strange feeling of drifting away, a bit like I was falling asleep although I wasn’t tired. My head lolled forward and then I jerked awake again in shock. I pulled over immediately and realised my heart was racing. Luckily, I was only doing 30 miles per hour so there was no accident. But it was frightening.’
The musician immediately went to a nearby A&E, where nurses discovered his pulse was three times the normal rate. Further tests, including an ECG (electrocardiogram), chest X-rays and a heart ultrasound, revealed Magne was suffering from AF.
‘It felt like some kind of sick joke,’ he reveals. ‘I considered myself fit and healthy – more than that, I took pride in my good health. And I was being told I had a serious heart problem. It didn’t really sink in at first.’
AF occurs when normal co-ordination between the atria and the ventricles is lost, causing the heart to beat erratically –arrhythmia. Aside from being alarming and uncomfortable, this starves parts of the body of blood – and therefore oxygen – causing symptoms such as fainting.
If an attack lasts more than 24 hours, the ineffective pumping can allow blood to pool within the atria. This can then coagulate and form clots that can be pumped round the body. Clots may block arteries in the brain to cause a stroke.
Those with AF have double the normal risk of having a stroke.
Doctors initially prescribed Magne the blood-thinning drug warfarin, to prevent such clots from forming. He was also given beta-blockers, drugs that slow the release of the hormones that raise the heart rate. In mild cases, however, aspirin may be all that is needed.
‘I was kept in overnight, by which time my heart had slowed down,’
explains Magne. ‘The next day I was allowed home, but over the next week I kept having mild attacks.
‘I would be sitting doing nothing and suddenly my heart would race and I would feel faint. It was scary.’
Hands on: Magne is on a reunion tour with A-ha
After two weeks, the beta-blockers had still failed to control the attacks, so Magne returned to hospital where he underwent a procedure known as cardioversion, in which controlled electrical shocks are administered via pads placed on the chest to stop then restart the heart muscle – Magne’s ‘reboot’.
It takes about ten minutes and is successful in stopping an attack in 90 per cent of cases. However, it is not a cure and most patients will go on to have another attack.
‘They told me if they shocked my heart, it would reset itself and start beating normally,’ explains Magne.
‘I was awake but sedated so I couldn’t feel anything. It didn’t work the first time as my heart continued beating wildly, so they had to do it again straight away. That time it worked. Afterwards I felt an aching soreness. It felt like someone had hit me hard in the chest.’
The procedure was a success, and Magne was able to return to the usual rounds of rehearsing, recording and family life. But later that year he suffered another prolonged attack, and was rushed back to hospital to receive further cardioversion.
‘I was told if an attack lasted more than 48 hours I would have to have the shock treatment again. The attack started after a Press event and I felt the familiar breathlessness.
‘When it didn’t go away after a day, I went to A&E, where they gave me warfarin and kept me in for observation. The next day, I was given another reboot, which did the trick.’
Although he has not suffered another long attack since, there have been numerous minor ones. Today his condition is controlled with a drug called flecainide which works by decreasing the sensitivity of the heart muscle cells to electrical impulses.
Magne explains: ‘It’s been on and off. For the past six months, while promoting the new album, I’ve had an attack almost every night. I pop a pill and normally it goes away after a few hours. Usually, I’ll just read or do some work.
‘I always know when one is coming because I start to feel short-tempered. Then my heart starts to beat heavily in my throat, and I feel jittery. Also, I get extremely cold feet and fingers because of the effect on my circulation.’
Paradoxically, Magne has found it is not stress itself that brings on attacks, but that relaxing after a stressful event is the trigger. ‘In fact, stress seems to actually override attacks sometimes,’ he says. ‘Often I can be having one and it will magically disappear just before I go on stage, as the adrenaline kicks in.’
Consultant cardiologist Dr Vias Markides, at the Royal Brompton & Harefield NHS Foundation Trust, one of the country’s largest centres for the treatment of heart-rhythm problems, explains: ‘AF is a complex condition. It can happen with age, as the heart naturally wears out, or because of an abnormality in the structure of the heart. In some patients the atria become stretched, possibly due to a heart attack, high blood pressure or other heart disease.
Concerns: Magne with wife Heidi. He admits she is ‘worried’ by his condition
‘But it can also occur in healthy individuals in their 30s for apparently no reason – this is commonly known as vagal-AF, as it is related to the action of the vagus nerve which electrically links the base of the brain to our heart in a circuit and sends messages to the heart to slow down.
‘In fact, we often see this type of AF in very fit individuals, as exercise activates
the vagus nerve. In most cases, we can control the condition and patients can lead relatively normal lives.’
However, the severity and frequency of attacks can increase over time. If drug treatment and cardioversion are ineffective, surgery is an option. During the complex procedure, a catheter is threaded up into the heart via a vein in the groin. A flexible filament is inserted through the tube which is used to heat the area of the heart in spasm. This produces a small scar that blocks nerve impulses, so disconnecting the cause of the abnormal rhythm.
This is seen as a last resort, as about three per cent of patients suffer serious complications –including internal bleeding, a stroke or nerve damage. About one in 1,000 patients die as a result of the operation.
If attacks become debilitating, a pacemaker can be fitted – but this is usually considered only when other options have been exhausted.
‘I hope I don’t have to go down these roads,’ says Magne. ‘But I suppose I will have to accept that there may be no other option in the future. Morten and Paul have been great about it – they don’t treat me differently. They understand we can’t argue too much over songs, because it could end up with me having an attack later.
‘Heidi was obviously very worried. She thinks I should avoid touring but understands why I do it. After my family, music is my passion.’
Despite the heavy burden such a condition represents, Magne remains philosophical about his predicament. ‘I know it sounds corny, but I’m actually grateful for the experiences AF has given me,’ he says. ‘After the initial shock wore off I was more than a little depressed.
‘I spent a lot of time staring into the fireplace and pondering my imagined lack of a future.
‘But it also prompted a much healthier lifestyle: a balanced diet, regular exercise, absolutely no alcohol or coffee for almost three years. The result is that, overall, I’m in much better physical health than before. It has made me more aware of my limitations.
‘It’s also taught me that I must not internalise stress. I live a much healthier life. I’ve learned never to turn down a glass of water and to enjoy walking in the woods. I’ve come to regard my condition as a blessing wrapped as a curse.’
• A-ha’s new single, Nothing Is Keeping You Here, is released on September 21 on Universal. www.a-ha.com
What is an AF attack?
‘The heart has four chambers: the ventricles, two muscular chambers in the lower part of the heart that pump the blood out, and the atria, the two top chambers which hold the blood returning to the heart,’ explains Dr Vias Markides.
‘When we talk of the heart beating, we are really referring to the sudden tightening of the muscles so that the chambers become smaller, squeezing the blood out.
‘The control of the heartbeat starts with a small clump of muscle cells in the right atrium, called the sinoatrial node. This acts as a natural pacemaker by transporting electrical impulses to the atrioventricular node, located between the atria and ventricles.
‘This node determines the rate of contraction of the ventricles. It is the contraction of the left ventricle that produces the pulse rate.
‘Atrial fibrillation occurs when the atrioventricular node receives more nerve messages than it can handle. These erratic impulses cause irregular squeezing of the ventricles, the result of which is an irregular pulse.
‘In turn, this can cause dizziness, breathlessness and chest pains - although some sufferers do not feel anything until the condition is advanced.
‘If the heart rate associated with AF is rapid enough and persists for several months, patients may develop cardiomyopathy - disease of the heart muscle - and ultimately suffer heart failure.
‘Initial treatment includes drugs to thin the blood, and medication to bring the heart beat under control.
‘If this is unsuccessful, and if the condition is caught early, cardioversion is used. Only in extreme cases is surgery or a pacemaker considered.’
• www.bhf.org.uk
Daily Mail
Thanks to bhansen1.
