Characteristics of the study population
A total of 2,628 consecutive patients were included in the study with 268 patients (10.1%) exhibiting AF before surgical AVR. Baseline patient characteristics are shown in Table 1. Patients who had preoperative AF were older and more often received bioprostheses rather than mechanical AVR. These individuals had a higher prevalence of risk factors including hypertension, diabetes mellitus, peripheral vascular disease, previous myocardial infarction, raised preoperative serum creatinine, and poor left ventricular function (defined as left ventricular ejection fraction <30% as assessed by transthoracic echocardiography) compared with patients who had preoperative SR [Table 1]. The patients were followed up for a median of 1508 [790–2611] days, approximately 4 [2–7] years.