Skip Navigation

Cardiovascular Research 1998 38(1):69-81; doi:10.1016/S0008-6363(97)00289-7
© 1998 by European Society of Cardiology
This Article
Right arrow Full Text Freely available
Right arrow FREE Full Text (PDF) Freely available
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Holm, M.
Right arrow Articles by Olsson, S.B.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by Holm, M.
Right arrow Articles by Olsson, S.B.
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

Copyright © 1998, European Society of Cardiology

Non-invasive assessment of the atrial cycle length during atrial fibrillation in man: introducing, validating and illustrating a new ECG method

Magnus Holma,*, Steen Pehrsona, Max Ingemanssona, Leif Sörnmoc, Rolf Johanssona, Lennart Sandhallb, Max Sunemarka, Birgit Smideberga, Christian Olssona and S.Bertil Olssona

aDepartment of Cardiology, University Hospital, S-221 85 Lund, Sweden
bDepartment of Radiology, University Hospital, Lund, Sweden
cDepartment of Applied Electronics, Lund University, Lund, Sweden

* Corresponding author. Fax: +46 (46) 157857; E-mail: magnus.holm@kard.lu.se

Objectives: Atrial fibrillation (AF) in man has previously been shown to include a wide variety of atrial activity. Assessment of the characteristics of this arrhythmia with a commonly applicable tool may therefore be important in the choice and evaluation of different therapeutic strategies. As the AF cycle length has been shown to correlate locally with atrial refractoriness and globally with the degree of atrial organization, with, in general, shorter cycle length during apparently random AF compared to more organized AF, we have developed a new method for non-invasive assessment of the AF cycle length using the surface and the esophagus (ESO) ECG. Methods and Results: From the frequency spectrum of the residual ECG, created by suppression of the QRST complexes, the dominant atrial cycle length (DACL) was derived. By comparison with multiple intracardiac simultaneously acquired right and left AF cycle lengths in patients with paroxysmal AF, we found that the DACL in lead V1, ranging from 130 to 185 ms, well represented a spatial average of the right AF cycle lengths, whereas the DACL in the ESO ECG, ranging from 140 to 185 ms, reflected both the right and the left AF cycle length, where the influence from each structure depended on the atrial anatomy of the individual, as determined by MRI. In patients with chronic AF, the method was capable of following changes in the AF cycle length due to administration of D,L-sotalol and 5 min of ECG recording was sufficient for the DACL to be reproducible. Conclusions: We conclude that this new non-invasive method, named ‘Frequency Analysis of Fibrillatory ECG’ (FAF-ECG), is capable of assessing both the magnitude and the dynamics of the atrial fibrillation cycle length in man.

KEYWORDS Human; Atrium; Fibrillation; Cycle length; ECG; Frequency analysis; Non-invasive technique


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?




Disclaimer:
Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.