An undesirable cardiac impact of vigorous sport practice: Lone atrial fibrillation

Abstract

Atrial fibrillation (AF), characterized by rapid chaotic electrical impulses of 300–600 per minute circulating within the atria and resulting in dysfunctional atrial activity and an irregular heart rate, is the most common sustained arrhythmia encountered in clinical practice. Lone AF is defined as AF in the absence of structural heart disease or other identifiable causes as hyperthyroidism or alcohol abuse. Regular physical activity have been well known to be associated with reduced cardiovascular morbidity [1,2]. However, some investigators have reported a significant association between excessive sport practice in competitive athletes and in recreational athletes and the occurrence of lone AF [3–5] during the last years. In a recently published paper, Elosua et al. [6] have evaluated the relation between sport practice and the prevalence of lone AF in men. In an agematched case-control study, 51 patients with lone AF and 109 control subjects were included. They have used a questionnaire to assess former and current sport practice and the number of lifetime hours of sport practice. The combination of current and prolonged lifetime sport practice (lifetime sport practice greater than 1500 h) have been shown to be associated with higher risk of lone AF. Similarly, Mont et al. [3] have investigated the association between long-term sport practice and lone AF in men. They have shown that a high proportion of men with lone AF (63%) had practised sport regularly for many years. This proportion is significantly higher than the proportion of males younger than 65 years who practise sport regularly in the general pop-