Premium
Antitachycardia Pacing for Ventricular Tachycardia Using Implantable Cardioverter Defibrillators:
Author(s) -
SWEENEY MICHAEL O.
Publication year - 2004
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.1540-8159.2004.00622.x
Subject(s) - medicine , ventricular tachycardia , cardiac pacing , cardiology , medical school , clinical cardiology , medical emergency , medical education
Antitachycardia pacing (ATP) refers to the use of pacing stimulation techniques for termination of tachyarrhythmias. Such techniques can be automatically applied using implantable cardioverter defibrillators (ICDs) and offer the potential for painless termination of ventricular tachycardia (VT). Reduction in painful shocks may improve patient quality-of-life (QOL) and extend ICD pulse generator longevity. Numerous older studies have consistently demonstrated that ATP can reliably terminate ∼ 85%-90% of slow VT (cycle lengths [CL] < 300–320 ms) with a low risk of acceleration (1%-5%).1 More recently similar high success and low acceleration rates for fast VT (CL 320–240 ms) have been demonstrated. These observations have repositioned the ICD as primarily an ATP device with defibrillation backup only as needed.