In the Loop with Nadja Wlasiuk

The holidays are supposed to be festive, but for your heart’s electrical system, they can be a little chaotic. More drinks, less sleep, travel days, salty food, and stress. It’s the kind of combination that can make even a normally well-behaved heart act up. In today’s episode of In the Loop with Nadja Wlasiuk, we’re talking about holiday heart syndrome, that spike in arrhythmias, most commonly atrial fibrillation, that can show up around times of celebration, especially with heavier alcohol intake.

Joining me is one of my friends and colleagues, Dr. Albert Liu, a cardia...

Welcome back to In The Loop with Nadja Wlasiuk. Today, we’re diving into something I see nearly every day in practice, pacemakers, the small life-changing devices that keep the heart beating in rhythm when its natural electrical system can’t keep up. Whether it’s from age-related conduction disease, sinus node dysfunction, or for atrial fibrillation, pacemakers can restore energy, prevent fainting, and quite literally give people their lives back.

We’ll explore what a pacemaker actually does, how it knows when to step in, and the differences between single chamber, dual chamber, cardiac resynchronization, or CRT, and...

Welcome back to In the Loop with Nadja Wlasiuk.

Today’s episode is deeply personal. My guests are my oldest daughter, Lydia, and her partner, Nick, a 35-year-old musician with the rock-and-roll (very bluesy) band Honey Hounds, who was recently diagnosed with a very rare and aggressive cancer (sinonasal teratocarcinosarcoma).

What started as a stubborn sinus infection quickly became something far more serious. Together, we talk about how easily symptoms can be minimized or dismissed, what it’s like to fight for answers, and the emotional and practical realities of navigating a rare diagnosis that has...

Welcome back to In The Loop with Nadja Wlasiuk. In this episode, we are diving into a rhythm that affects millions of people worldwide, atrial fibrillation. Atrial fibrillation, or AFib, is the most common heart rhythm problem that we see.

In the United States alone, more than 5 million people are living with it, and that number is expected to double or even triple by 2050. It accounts for a huge portion of hospitalizations and long-term medication use, and it can have major impacts not just on health, but on quality of life. So if you're a patient who's...

Welcome back to In the Loop with Nadja Wlasiuk, where we break down important healthcare topics to keep you informed and empowered. Today’s episode is one that’s both professional and deeply personal for me—we’re talking about preeclampsia. I’ve experienced it twice during my own pregnancies, and while I was fortunate to have good outcomes, I wasn’t told at the time about the increased risk for heart disease, stroke, and other vascular complications later in life. That missing piece of education is one of the reasons I’m so passionate about having this conversation today.

J...

Welcome back to In the Loop with Nadja Wlasiuk, where we make sense of the heart's most curious rhythms, one beat at a time. Today's episode is a special one because we're talking about a device that's not only central to my everyday clinical practice, but also part of the inspiration behind the name of this show, the Implantable Loop Recorder.

That's right-

I literally put people “in the loop.”

Or rather, I put “the loop in them.”

These small but mighty devices help us uncover the elusive causes of fainting, palpitat...

In today's episode, we're diving into the world of adult congenital heart disease, or ACHD, a field that's growing as more and more children with congenital heart defects are surviving and thriving into adulthood. But living with a heart that was structurally different from birth brings lifelong considerations. And not all adult cardiology teams are equipped to manage these unique patients.

To help us understand this specialized area of care, I'm joined by Karina Manayan, nurse practitioner with the Adult Congenital Heart Disease Program at UCSF Health. Karina works at the intersection of two worlds, guiding patients...

Imagine you're caring for a patient who’s been short of breath for months. Their echocardiogram shows right heart strain, but they’re young, with no obvious cardiac disease. You’re thinking: What am I missing?

In today’s episode, we’re taking a closer look at pulmonary hypertension—a condition that’s often misdiagnosed or missed entirely until it’s advanced. It can mimic more common conditions like asthma or heart failure, but its management requires a very specific and nuanced approach.

To guide us through it, I’m joined by Emily Fedewa, nurse practitioner with...

In today's episode, I wanted to do things a little bit differently. I've asked my friend and colleague, Joan, to interview me. I wanted to give you an opportunity to learn more about my story, the experiences that shaped my career, and my passion for making healthcare knowledge more approachable. If you'd like to get to know me better, this episode is a great start. You can also check out the show notes from today's episode on Substack, my UCSF health profile, or my Instagram and TikTok.

I feel that I've lived several lives already, and I'm...

The motivation behind today’s episode comes from frequent interactions with patients asking for advice on weight loss, nutrition, and fitness. All three of these are really important modifiable lifestyle factors that I speak to every day, but don’t have the bandwidth to address in depth during a brief 30 minute follow up. I personally feel that as healthcare providers, many, if not most of us, are poorly prepared to counsel patients on anything but society guidelines- which are great, like the American Heart association recommendation of 150 minutes (2.5 hours of moderate aerobic exercise).

But how does one do t...

In today’s episode I have the honor of sharing the microphone with one of the founders (or godfathers if you will) of cardiac electrophysiology, Dr. Melvin Scheinman.

Dr. Scheinman is originally from the northeast- growing up in Brooklyn New York. He was awarded a scholarship to Johns Hopkins University where he graduated first in his class. He attended medical school at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. His residency was completed at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill and his cardiology fellowship at UCSF.

He is probably most well known for being the fi...

In today’s episode I’m joined by my friend Carlo Piscitello to discuss the AppleWatch and atrial fibrillation. Carlo is a process engineer and athlete who was in his normal state of health with no past cardiac history when he was notified by his AppleWatch that he was in atrial fibrillation.

As you know, I am an electrophysiology nurse practitioner. I specialize in cardiac arrhythmia. In my clinical practice I encourage my patients to wear FDA approved ECG capable smart watches for at least 12 hours a day, making sure it is comfortably snug on the wrist, and...