Pulmonary vein orientation assessment: Is it necessary in patients undergoing contact force sensing guided radiofrequency catheter ablation of atrial fibrillation

Abstract

PurposeWe hypothesized that pulmonary vein (PV) orientation influences tissue contact of the contact force (CF) sensing radiofrequency ablation catheter (CFC) and therefore atrial fibrillation (AF) free survival after pulmonary vein isolation (PVI). The aim of this study was to determine the association between PV orientation, CF and AF free survival in patients undergoing CFC PVI. MethodsSixty consecutive patients undergoing CFC PVI were included. ECG-triggered cardiac CT scans were obtained in all patients before PVI, and the PV orientation was measured at the insertion in the LA for all PVs in both the transverse and frontal plane. PVs were assigned to 1 of 4 orientation groups: ventral–caudal, dorsal–caudal, ventral–cranial and dorsal–cranial. ResultsMean age was 59years, 88% had paroxysmal AF. AF free survival off anti-arrhythmic drugs after a median follow-up of 12months was 58% after a single PVI procedure. No association was found between PV orientation and CF. Furthermore, no association was found between PV orientation and AF free survival. In univariate analysis, the number of lesions with a mean CF of 10g was associated with AF free survival. However, in multivariate analysis, only the AF duration was significantly associated with AF free survival. ConclusionsThis study shows that in patients undergoing PVI with the CFC ablation system, PV orientation does not affect CF and is not associated with AF free survival. PV orientation assessment does not appear to be necessary in patients undergoing CFC PVI.