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Atrial Flutter Secondary to Hypokalemia
Author(s) -
VARRIALE PHILIP,
KWA RAYMOND P.,
PARIKH NARESH
Publication year - 1983
Publication title -
pacing and clinical electrophysiology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.686
H-Index - 101
eISSN - 1540-8159
pISSN - 0147-8389
DOI - 10.1111/j.1540-8159.1983.tb06574.x
Subject(s) - hypokalemia , medicine , atrial flutter , cardiology , p wave , atrial fibrillation , refractory period , anesthesia
Electrophysiologic studies support significant hypokalemia as a cause of atrial flutter in a patient without manifest heart disease. Atrial flutter, reproducibly initiated and terminated by rapid atrial pacing during hypokalemia, was not inducible after potassium correction. In an individual with existing atrial conduction disease, hypokalemia may generate both non‐uniform atrial refractoriness and atrial premature beats, and it may facilitate the development of atrial flutter as a re‐entrant arrhythmia.