Reduced Procedure Time and Variability with Active Esophageal Cooling During Radiofrequency Ablation for Atrial Fibrillation

• DOI: 10.3791/64417-v
• Publication Date: 2022-08-26T00:00:29Z
• Authors: Christopher Joseph; Julie Cooper; Robert W. Turer; Samuel A. McDonald; Erik Benjamin Ku...; James Daniels
• Keywords: Mallinckrodt

Various methods are utilized during radiofrequency (RF) pulmonary vein isolation (PVI) for the treatment of atrial fibrillation (AF) to protect esophagus from inadvertent thermal injury. Active esophageal cooling is increasingly being used over traditional luminal temperature (LET) monitoring, and each approach may influence procedure times variability around those times. The objective this study measure effects on time in two different protection strategies utilizing advanced informatics techniques facilitate data extraction. Trained clinical informaticists first performed a contextual inquiry catheterization laboratory determine workflows observe documentation procedural within electronic health record (EHR). These EHR structures were then identified reporting database, facilitating extraction EHR. A manual chart review using REDCap database created was identify additional elements, including type used. Procedure duration compared summary statistics standard measures dispersion. total 164 patients underwent PVI timeframe; 63 (38%) treated with LET 101 (62%) active cooling. mean 176 min (SD 52 min) monitoring group 156 40 (P = 0.012). Thus, associated reduced variation when monitoring.