ANTITACHYCARDIA PACING: OPTIMAL PROGRAMMING AND PREDICTION OF EFFICACY
FOR THE TREATMENT OF VENTRICULAR ARRHYTHMIAS. STATE OF THE ART AND
PERSPECTIVE.
Abstract
Introduction: Antitachycardia pacing (ATP) is one of the
therapies provided by an implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD)
for the treatment of ventricular arrhythmias (VA). Successful ATP leads
to avoidance of shock, that is related to an increase in mortality and
morbidity. Methods and Results: A total of 63 documents have been
obtained by using the key term “Antitachycardia pacing” in PubMed,
focusing on optimal ATP and ICD programing to reduce inappropriate or
avoidable therapies, predictive factors of ATP efficacy and latest
technologies and devices still in experimentation. Conclusions:
Antitachycardia pacing confirms to be a good therapeutic tool to
interrupt ventricular arrhythmias. An optimal ICD programming could lead
to the reduction of inappropriate or avoidable ATP therapies.
Furthermore, a better knowledge in predictive factors of ATP efficacy
not only could better orient physicians on the device to implant, but
also could allow for a better arrhythmic risk stratification.