Acute porphyrias and heart health

What's UP Doc?
Written By Dr. Karl Anderson

What's UP Doc? Is a regular column where we feature a patient question along with a response from a member of the UPA Scientific Advisory Board.

Can having tachycardia (fast, irregular heartbeat) due to acute hepatic porphyria cause long term health issues? If you have tachycardia from AHP, are there things you can do to protect your heart?

This week, Dr. Karl Anderson and Dr. Herbert Bonkovsky, both of the UPA Scientific Advisory Board and Porphyrias Consortium collaborated to answer this question.

Tachycardia refers only to a heart rate that is faster than normal. For example, it may accompany fever or dehydration, and is common during acute attacks of porphyria. Arrhythmia is the term reserved for a condition in which the heart rhythm is abnormal, either irregular or regular, most often due to a heart condition.

Most patients with AHPs experience tachycardia only during acute attacks, and it improves as the attack resolves. Arrhythmias are less common and may need further evaluation. If such attacks are treated promptly and with success, the long-term risk to the heart and cardiovascular system is slight or nil.

Most patients with recurrent or chronic tachycardia or arrhythmias do not suffer from AHP. Patients with AHPs and such problems are best evaluated and managed by a physician with expertise in the porphyrias and a cardiologist.

Thank you to Dr. Anderson and Dr. Bonkovsky for this What's UP Doc? answer! Do you have a question for a porphyria expert? Send it to info@porphyria.org.

 

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Dr. Karl Anderson

Dr. Anderson is a graduate of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, completed residency in internal medicine at Vanderbilt University Hospital and the New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center, followed by training in gastroenterology also at Cornell. He was a member of the faculty at the Rockefeller University, Cornell University Medical College and New York Medical College before coming to the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston in 1987, where he is a Professor in the Department of Internal Medicine (Division of Gastroenterology and Hepatology).

He directs the Porphyria Laboratory and Center at UTMB, which is part of the NIH-supported Porphyrias Consortium. He is an active clinical investigator with support from the NIH, FDA, foundations and industry. His research focusses on the human porphyrias and their treatment.

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