Growing up I regularly had heart palpitations, aka just beating really hard in my chest, even if I was just laying around. Of course, this was of great concern, and finally one day I went to the Georgia Tech Health Center. Unfortunately, they got an irregular EKG (heart monitoring machine reading) back on my report. They immediately sent me to Emory to get further testing. For a month I had to wear a heart monitor, record its patterns when it went crazy and then phone them into the hospital. At the end of the ordeal, they had no idea what the problem was.
I found out later in life, my uncle also experienced something similar growing up and so have other tall people I've asked about it. Then a few months ago a friend of mine, Marge Tamas, who is a medical writer at my company passed on some new information regarding the QT Interval.
The QT Interval represents the conduction delay between the time that the ventricles fire off and the heart muscle recharges. Basically, its a timing mechanism and longer intervals in the EKG tell healthcare professionals something could be wrong. Well, in a recent study, they have discovered that people with bigger hearts (aka taller people and athletes) will naturally have longer QT intervals because the heart is bigger.
This is by no means to say not to worry if you are having heart problems, definitely see your physician. However, at the time I was diagnosed with what I suppose was a longer QT, I was told by a crying nurse that I could die at any minute. Now that may be a bit overboard and tramatic to a 19 year old trying to play college basketball at the time.
Here is the article
http://www.reuters.com/article/healthNews/idUSTON40532920080124
Any other stories on heart and cardio stuff some may care to share?