At every physical you’ve ever received, your healthcare provider has probably pulled out their stethoscope and listened to your heart. Observing how your heart performs as you sit there gives them an idea of your current cardiac health. It isn’t, however, always the most accurate way to see how your heart is doing overall.
That’s because the heart needs to perform under a variety of different conditions. Pumping blood when you’re at rest is one thing. Doing its required work while you’re exerting yourself is entirely another.
That’s why our team of providers sometimes recommends graded exercise tests, or GXTs, when we’re trying to diagnose heart conditions. By using this kind of testing here at Cullman Internal Medicine, we can assess you for many different heart problems.
This kind of testing involves exercising while we gradually increase your level of exertion (that’s the “graded” part of the name). It’s also called a stress test because it helps us see how your heart does under stress.
At the beginning of your test, you walk on a treadmill while our team monitors your heart, blood pressure, and breathing. By periodically increasing your activity on the treadmill, we can see how your heart performs under different conditions.
This allows us to identify issues that might be causing symptoms like chest pain, shortness of breath, or irregular heart rhythm. With GXT, we might be able to diagnose or move toward the diagnosis of:
We can also use this kind of testing to determine how much exercise is safe for you and to see how your heart is responding to any treatment we’ve recommended.
We offer this kind of testing right here at our office.
Dress for your exercise stress test in clothes that you feel comfortable moving in. Wear walking or running shoes. We usually also ask you not to eat, smoke, or have caffeine beforehand. Our team tells you about any specific prep you need based on your test and what we’re checking for during it.
Once you get to your appointment, we’ll attach electrodes to your chest using sticky pads. These help us monitor your heart throughout your test.
You’ll start on the treadmill at a gentle walking pace. We’ll increase the speed in stages, then observe how your heart does at each level of exertion. The exercise part of your test usually lasts 15 minutes or less.
You can stop the test at any time. Remember, though, that our team continually monitors you during your GXT to keep you safe.
After your test, our team reviews the data we gathered. This helps us figure out what’s going on with your heart and develop a treatment plan for you.
If you’ve been experiencing symptoms like chest pain, irregular heartbeat, or shortness of breath, this noninvasive test gives you an excellent way to learn what’s going on. To see if a GXT could be right for you, call our office or book an appointment online today.
