CHICAGO -- Chicago Cubs second baseman Mark DeRosa has left spring training in Arizona to undergo further tests on his heart at a Chicago hospital.
DeRosa -- who turns 33 on Tuesday -- was hospitalized over the weekend after complaining of a rapid heartbeat during spring training drills Saturday morning.
DeRosa met briefly with reporters at the Cubs spring training camp on Monday and said he may consider an unspecified surgical procedure to get his heart back into rhythm.
"If it is surgery, it's an outpatient one," DeRosa said, according to The Chicago Tribune. "A lot of people take medicine. I don't want to deal with that. I'm 32, I don't want to be on medication for the rest of my life if there's a procedure I can do. It's something I've been able to control without any help. The other day was a wake-up call that I probably need to figure some things out and just get it fixed."
The Cubs have stressed that DeRosa's condition isn't life-threatening, and DeRosa said he hopes to be back on the playing field in a week.
The Cubs would not comment on DeRosa's current situation.
"Until Mark sees the cardiologist, it's too early to speculate on what the procedure, if any, would be," Cubs spokesman Peter Chase said, according to the Tribune.
DeRosa said he has experienced atrial dysrhythmia, or an irregular heartbeat, since he was 16 years old.
"It's happened during games. It's happened playing golf. It's happened watching TV," he said, according to the Tribune. "There's no rhyme or reason as to why it happens. I've been able to do techniques I learned as a high school kid to take myself right out of it without anybody knowing."
The Cubs signed DeRosa to a three-year, $13 million contract in November of 2006. Last year, he batted .293 with 10 home runs and 72 RBIs in 149 games.
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.