Atrial Fibrillation Ablation Results Differ Between Men and Women According to Results from Dr. John Mandrola — Video

Atrial Fibrillation Ablation Results Differ Between Men and Women According to Results from Dr. John Mandrola — Video

By Mellanie True Hills

November 28, 2011

  • Summary: Atrial fibrillation ablation results vary between women and men according to the poster presented by Dr. John Mandrola at the American Heart Association Scientific Sessions 2011.
  • Reading and watching time is approximately 4 minutes

In this video interview at the American Heart Association Scientific Sessions 2011, Dr. John Mandrola discussed the poster he presented there about gender-specific results of atrial fibrillation ablation in a private practice setting and how women do not fare as well as men.

View the video interview with Dr. Mandrola (approximately 3 minutes)

See the Poster Dr. Mandrola Presented on Gender-Specific AF Ablation Results in Private Practice   

About John Mandrola, MD:

Cardiac Electrophysiologist
Baptist Medical Associates and Baptist Hospital East
Louisville, KY

For more information, see:

Video Transcript:

Mellanie True Hills: Dr. Mandrola, would you share with us what you’re presenting here at American Heart Association?

Dr. John Mandrola: Our poster is on the gender-specific results of atrial fibrillation ablation in a private practice setting. We looked at our four-year experience at a small community hospital. It’s a 500-bed hospital in Louisville, Kentucky. We considered patients who had persistent or paroxysmal afib. We don’t ablate permanent AF patients. We did AF ablation with wide-area ablation—typical AF ablation. We did left atrial ablation beyond standard PVI when we thought it was important to terminate atrial fibrillation or left-atrial flutter, for instance. We looked at our success rate, and we defined it by typical private practice parameters; that is, assessment of symptoms, ECGs, and Holters. When indicated, we analyzed our data in usual chi-squared and T-tests. We had 213 patients, and 282 procedures.

There are four results. Number one is that women were significantly underrepresented in the group of patients who had AF ablation. There were 69 percent males in our study, and 31 percent women. That was very statistically significant. Then, when we compared it to a group of afib patients who had AV node ablation—palliative AV node ablation—we found that it was reverse, that there were many more women in that group than men. So that was our first result.

The second result is that when we looked at repeat AF ablations, that there were more women who needed repeat AF ablations, and 44 percent women and 35 percent men had repeat AF ablations.

The third result is that when we looked at additional ablation beyond standard PVI, we found that there was a trend towards women having more left-atrial ablation beyond PVI; meaning mitral isthmus lines, left atrial-roof lines, etc.

And then, the final piece of data, and I think, the most important data for talking with women before AF ablation is that, when we looked at our long-term success, we found that men had a higher success rate than women. And this was whether they were on antiarrhythmic drugs or off antiarrhythmic drugs.

So our chief findings are that women, indeed, are underrepresented in AF ablation, overrepresented in palliative AV node ablation, and that they’re more difficult to ablate. And we think that this is important clinical data in the real world so that we can better discuss these issues with AF patients.

Mellanie: Thank you very much and we will put up the copy of your poster because it has some great data that folks should see. Thanks so much.