50 decibel aortic valve :-|

Hi friends,

I am losing my friggin mind over the sound of my ON-X aortic valve lately. Surgery 5/2023. The first few months I only heard it if I leaned forward. But over the last few months, it's increasingly loud. (Examples below.)

It bothers me so much that my psychiatrist gave me Xanax for the worst days. I am jealous of everyone who says you get used to it. I cannot imagine getting used to something that I can hear over a normal TV volume.

Although this app is not calibrated (so the decibel number could be off), you can see the heartbeat is clearly detectable over ambient room noise (which includes a fridge and heating system). [I scratched out instantaneous measurements while taking the screenshot itself. Focus on the heartbeat pattern.]

Elaborating: Three observations make me think it objectively got louder. First, two coworkers in the last month have asked if I'm wearing a watch, yet not a single comment in the year of work and school before that. Second, lately I've occasionally turned up the TV to hear over it.

Most notably, during a hearing test, I expressed my concern that I would miss some of the tones only because of my heart valve. The tech was surprised and said that isn't possible unless the valve is at least 50 decibels. So I got the idea to try an app.

I can deal with warfarin (still testing weekly; it's all over the place) OR the sound, but together they're destroying my mental health. Just need to vent. <3

Sorry to hear about the sound. Setting aside calibration, measuring sound intensity needs distance to make sense. This is typically at 1meter from the source of bit stated.

https://pressbooks.pub/sound/chapte...e square law and decibels,sound level by 6 dB.

As you can read there having the microphone closer amplifies the measurement.

I'm about to hit the sack for the night but reach out if you want a hand with INR

Best wishes

NomadicOwl said:

ON-X aortic valve lately. Surgery 5/2023. The first few months I only heard it if I leaned forward. But over the last few months, it's increasingly loud

Click to expand...

I am very sorry to hear about this; you are in a tough situation. Have you talked with your cardiologist about this? Are there other changes in your health during the last few months? I worry that this may be a warning sign of other health problems.

I normally do not hear my On-X aortic valve. However, sometimes I am attacked by premature ventricular contractions (PVCs) which I feel/hear in my chest. It is important that I discuss these with my cardiologist and electrophysiologist.

I urge you to have your noisy valve examined by your cardiologist. Good luck!

It does seem weird. I would at least call cardiology. Could there be fluid or something like that amplifying the sound? Probably not but it’s a change.

I am also wondering if you have looked into any kind of masking sound to reduce the distress you experience. My son (29M) has tinnitus and it’s quite emotionally upsetting for him to constantly have sound generated internally. He actually needed lorazepam for a short while to cope. He’s on a daily depression med now (Zoloft) that has made a difference, and he has benefited from weekly mental health therapy to build a toolkit of coping skills (never was willing before, but the tinnitus laid him low enough that he decided to do it). He also has experimented with many many types of masking noises, mostly sourced from YouTube though there are also various apps. These have helped considerably with stress reduction from the tinnitus. Many are tuned to different frequencies and types of sounds and he customizes to the situation and the pitches and volumes that are present.

He would really like and actual cure but that doesn’t really exist right now. It is still rough when he gets flares but overall these strategies have helped quite a bit. I don’t know if any of these ideas will apply to valve noise but if one does I will be glad I brought it up. If not you have my sympathy at least. I just had OHS a month ago so very much still healing. I have an On-X mitral.

It does seem odd that the sound has increased well after surgery, so I agree: worth discussing with a cardiologist, or your surgeon.