Abstract
Ablation using pulmonary vein isolation (PVI) to treat atrial fibrillation is effective; however, there is limited information regarding mortality after discharge. Recent studies of the Nationwide Readmissions Database have found higher than expected mortality after ablation procedures. A database created by the Dallas-Fort Worth Hospital Council (DFWHC) includes a collaboration of 90 member hospitals in North Texas reporting data on procedures, diagnoses, and discharges. All patients in this system can be followed longitudinally via unique identification number. The availability of this database offers additional opportunities to better quantify mortality rates after PVI. Measure the incidence and timing of mortality after PVI in a large regional database. We queried the DFWHC database for all PVI ablations occurring over the timeframe from January 2013 to December 2019. We then queried the resulting population for all subsequent hospital visits and discharge outcomes. A total of 11,880 unique PVI procedures were performed over this 7 year time span, with 1242 occurring in 2013, increasing to 3177 in 2019 (a 156% increase over these 7 years). Out of this group, at total of 130 deaths occurred (1.1%), with 4 (.32%) in 2013, and 32 (0.92%) in 2019; however, the majority of these were late events (beyond 120 days from the procedure). Mortality at 30, 60, 90, and 120 days after PVI was 7 (0.059%), 19 (0.16%), 21 (0.18%), and 24 (0.20%), respectively. In line with trends in recently reported data, mortality after PVI may be increasing slightly; however, overall mortality after PVI in this large regional database remains low, and early mortality is lower than that found in the Nationwide Readmissions Database.
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