Current vice-president Dick Cheney will receive treatment at George Washington University Hospital for a heart condition that manifests itself through and irregular heartbeat. Though the condition is not immediately life threatening, it can cause complications if not treated in time.

The 67-year-old Dick Cheney is no stranger to heart problems, having experienced four heart attacks dating to 1978. Because of his medical history, Cheney will be treated for the condition immediately. Doctors discovered the problem during a routine checkup. More precisely the vice-president is suffering from a recurrence of atrial fibrillation, an abnormal rhythm involving the upper chambers of his heart.

In other words, the upper chambers of the heart get desynchronized with the lower ones and the heart can’t pump blood efficiently. Last year, on November 26, Dick Cheney experienced a similar problem, an irregular heartbeat which was restored after the vice-president undertook a special medical procedure that induces an electrical shock to the heart in order to reestablish the normal rhythm.

This current turn of events made the vice-president cancel a campaign trip to Illinois, where he would have spoke at a reception for republican candidate for Congress, Marty Ozinga.

Studies show that approximately 2, 8 million Americans experience atrial fibrillation, which is the most common condition attributed to irregular rhythms of the heart. To this day, Dick Cheney suffered four heart attacks, quadruple-bypass surgery, an operation to implant a defibrillator and two artery-clearing procedures. Depending on the circumstances, in the case of atrial fibrillation, the heart can find its normal rhythm on its own, but if the condition is not treated in time it can develop some serious complications.